augment
Definition, pronunciation, etymology, and usage for the English word. Free spelling reference powered by Wiktionary.
Letters
7 characters
Language
English
word origin
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Detailed reference entry for the English word "augment", 7-letters, with pronunciation in International Phonetic Alphabet notation, etymology traced through Germanic and Romance roots where applicable, common misspelling variants catalogued from Hunspell error dictionaries, and usage frequency ranked against the top 100,000 English words in the Wordfreq corpus. PlainSpell covers English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and German spelling with confusable-pair detection that highlights visually and phonetically similar words. This entry for "augment" includes synonyms, antonyms, homophones, and cross-language translation pointers sourced from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org extract. Whether you are verifying the correct spelling of "augment" for academic writing, checking homophone confusion, or exploring etymological origins, this page provides a citation-backed, free reference that requires no sign-up.
augment is aEnglishverb. It means: To increase; to make larger or supplement. Pronounced /ɔːɡˈmɛnt/. Often confused with augmented and agent.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | augment |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Verb |
| IPA | /ɔːɡˈmɛnt/ |
| Letters | 7 |
| Frequency rank | #22,577 |
| Misspellings tracked | 10 |
| Confusable pairs | 5 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Frequency rank visualization
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for augment is 7 letters long, classified as averb, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /ɔːɡˈmɛnt/. Corpus data places it at rank #22,577 in overall English word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it.Wiktionary records 5 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our Hunspell-derived misspelling index lists 10 documented wrong-spelling variants for augment, with forms such as "agument", "augemnt", and "auggment". Each variant represents a distinct typo pattern that appears often enough in corpora to be worth flagging, typically a doubled-consonant error, a silent-letter drop, or a vowel substitution.It also participates in 5 confusable-pair relationships, "augmented", "agent", "argent", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English augmenten, from Middle French augmenter, from Old French augmenter, from Late Latin augmentare (“to increase”), from Latin augmentum (“an increase, growth”), from augere (“to increase”). Root origin matters for spelling because borrowed morphemes (Greek, Latin, Old French, Old English) carry their source-language orthographic conventions into modern English, which is why historical etymology is often the cleanest predictor of whether a cluster like "-ough", "-eau", or "-tion" will appear. For readers arriving here from a spelling check, the authoritative guidance is: the correct English form is augment, spelled A-U-G-M-E-N-T, and any other sequence of those letters, regardless of how natural it feels, is a misspelling in standard orthography.
Definition
- 1To increase; to make larger or supplement.
- 2To grow; to increase; to become greater.
- 3To slow the tempo or meter, e.g. for a dramatic or stately passage.
- 4To increase an interval, especially the largest interval in a triad, by a half step (chromatic semitone).
- 5To add an augment to.
Etymology
From Middle English augmenten, from Middle French augmenter, from Old French augmenter, from Late Latin augmentare (“to increase”), from Latin augmentum (“an increase, growth”), from augere (“to increase”).
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: agument,augemnt,auggment,augmennt,augmentt,augmetn,augmment,augmnet,aumgent,uagment
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
Relative frequency of common misspelling types for augment
Misspelling Variants of "augment"
Frequency rank: #22,577 in English
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Nearby English words
Other entries that begin with the letter A in our English index: