badge
Definition, pronunciation, etymology, and usage for the English word. Free spelling reference powered by Wiktionary.
Letters
5 characters
Language
English
word origin
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Detailed reference entry for the English word "badge", 5-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 "badge" 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 "badge" for academic writing, checking homophone confusion, or exploring etymological origins, this page provides a citation-backed, free reference that requires no sign-up.
badge is aEnglishnoun. It means: A distinctive mark, token, sign, emblem or cognizance, worn on one’s clothing, as an insignia of some rank, or of the membership of an organization. Pronounced /bæd͡ʒ/. It ranks #6,870 in English word frequency. Often confused with bag and BAE.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | badge |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /bæd͡ʒ/ |
| Letters | 5 |
| Frequency rank | #6,870 |
| Misspellings tracked | 7 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Frequency rank visualization
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for badge is 5 letters long, classified as anoun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /bæd͡ʒ/. Corpus data places it at rank #6,870 in overall English word frequency, indicating it appears regularly in written and spoken text.Wiktionary records 10 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our Hunspell-derived misspelling index lists 7 documented wrong-spelling variants for badge, with forms such as "abdge", "baddge", and "badeg". 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 20 confusable-pair relationships, "bag", "BAE", "base", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English badge, bagge, bage, bagy, from Anglo-Norman bage or Medieval Latin bagea, bagia (“sign, emblem”), of uncertain origin. Possibly derived from Medieval Latin baga (“ring”), from Old Saxon bāg, bōg (“ring, ornament”), from Proto-Germanic *b… 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 badge, spelled B-A-D-G-E, and any other sequence of those letters, regardless of how natural it feels, is a misspelling in standard orthography.
Definition
- 1A distinctive mark, token, sign, emblem or cognizance, worn on one’s clothing, as an insignia of some rank, or of the membership of an organization.
- 2A small nameplate, identifying the wearer, and often giving additional information.
- 3A card, sometimes with a barcode or magnetic strip, granting access to a certain area.
- 4Something characteristic; a mark; a token.
- 5A brand on the hand of a thief, etc.
- 6A carved ornament on the stern of a vessel, containing a window or the representation of one.
- 7A distinctive mark worn by servants, retainers, and followers of royalty or nobility, who, being beneath the rank of gentlemen, have no right to armorial bearings.
- 8A small overlay on an icon that shows additional information about that item, such as the number of new alerts or messages.
- 9An icon or emblem awarded to a user for some achievement.
- 10A police officer.
Etymology
From Middle English badge, bagge, bage, bagy, from Anglo-Norman bage or Medieval Latin bagea, bagia (“sign, emblem”), of uncertain origin. Possibly derived from Medieval Latin baga (“ring”), from Old Saxon bāg, bōg (“ring, ornament”), from Proto-Germanic *baugaz (“ring, bracelet, armband”); or possibly the Anglo-Norman word is derived from an earlier, unattested English word (compare Old English bēag (“ring, bracelet, collar, crown”). Cognate with Scots bagie, badgie, bawgy (“badge”).
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: abdge,baddge,badeg,badgge,bagde,bbadge,bdage
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
Relative frequency of common misspelling types for badge
Misspelling Variants of "badge"
Frequency rank: #6,870 in English
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Nearby English words
Other entries that begin with the letter B in our English index: