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PlainSpell

ax

/æks/noun, verb

ax is spelled A-X: 2 letters and one syllable. It appears 2.2 times per million words in written English, the 18,537th most frequent word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). People search “ax vs axe” about 6,600 times a month (Google, United States). As a noun, ax means “US standard spelling of axe” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). The plural of ax is axes.

How many letters and syllables are in ax?

Letters2: A-X
Syllables1 (from its American pronunciation)
In writing2.2 times per million words; the 18,537th most frequent word form
Wrong spellings searchednone measured in search
Pairs people search

Sources: letters and syllables from the English Wiktionary's hyphenation or pronunciation and the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary; written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media); Bing searches in the United States: the average month from September 2025 to August 2026 (Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, read September 30, 2026).

How common is ax?

Ax appears 2.2 times per million words in written English, the 18,537th most frequent word form in the list.

Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).

How do you pronounce ax?

  • /æks/

Ax has one syllable (counted from its American pronunciation in the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary).

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: LL-Q1860_(eng)-Vealhurl-ax.wav, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).

Words people confuse with ax

Word pairs people search, with the monthly searches for “a vs b” (G: Google, B: Bing, United States).

ax vs axe6,600 G
ask vs ax10 B

Also written: ask, axe.

Sources: Google and Bing searches (September 2025 to August 2026, through DataForSEO); English Wiktionary (homophones, alternative spellings).

Forms of ax

  • axes plural, present, singular, he/she/it
  • axing participle, present
  • axed participle, past

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

What does ax mean?

The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).

noun

  1. 1

    USUS standard spelling of axe.

verb

  1. 1

    USUS standard spelling of axe.

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

What to look up after ax