Balham
"balham" is a 6-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“Balham” is uncommon English (frequency #80,221 among 4,121 “B” headwords), classed as a proper noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- #80,221
- frequency rank, English
- 4,121
- “B” headwords
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - A suburb of London in the borough of Wandsworth, Greater London, England (OS grid ref TQ2873).
Corpus desk
Index EN-balham · Balham · English
Balham · rank #80,221 · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-RARE #80,221
- LEN-LONG 6 letters
- VOW-2 2 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-MID 4,121
- PHOTO-FINISH backman
Nearest frequency peer: backman (-2 rank slots)
Read with this headword: Spelling guide for this pattern
Desk codes from Wiktionary headword shape, FrequencyWords rank tier, confusable-pair count, generated misspelling depth, letter-cohort book size, and photo-finish peer. Not a difficulty grade.
Long-tail ranks near “Balham”
Sparse band: bars invert rank so rarer forms read shorter
- Avinash
Avinash
19,786 corpus weight
- Ayako
Ayako
19,784 corpus weight
- backman
backman
19,782 corpus weight
- Balham
Balham
19,780 corpus weight
- Bano
Bano
19,776 corpus weight
- barefaced
barefaced
19,775 corpus weight
What this shows Long-tail view: where “Balham” sits against similarly uncommon English ranks.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | Balham |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Proper noun |
| Letters | 6 |
| Frequency rank | #80,221 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “Balham” in English
Rare enough to double-check
Balham is uncommon English at frequency #80,221 among 4,121 “B” headwords, classed as aproper noun. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 2 senses are on record.
Balham has no tracked misspelling variants, and the word's spelling is regular enough that our generator found nothing worth flagging. Our confusable-pair dataset has no match for it, since its spelling is unusual enough that it doesn't cluster with a lookalike.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Belgeham (Domesday Book, 1086) and Bælgenham (957), from Old English bealg + hamm. The correct English form is Balham, spelled B-A-L-H-A-M.
Definition
- 1A suburb of London in the borough of Wandsworth, Greater London, England (OS grid ref TQ2873).
- 2A commune in Ardennes department, Grand Est, France.
Etymology
From Belgeham (Domesday Book, 1086) and Bælgenham (957), from Old English bealg + hamm.
Definitions, pronunciation, and etymology for this entry are drawn from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org structured extract (CC BY-SA); frequency ordering uses the FrequencyWords open word-frequency list (2018 English corpus, MIT). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.
Frequently Asked Questions
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Similar English words by spelling shape
Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "Balham", not the corpus desk frequency band.
Same letter count
Frequency-ranked English headwords with 6 letters (nearest by frequency rank).