basis
/ˈbeɪ.sɪs/noun
basis is spelled B-A-S-I-S: 5 letters and 2 syllables. It appears 65 times per million words in written English, the 1,636th most frequent word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). People search “base vs basis” about 50 times a month (Google, United States). As a noun, basis means “A physical base or foundation” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). The plural of basis is bases; Wiktionary also lists baseis (rare), basises (nonstandard).
How many letters and syllables are in basis?
| Letters | 5: B-A-S-I-S |
|---|---|
| Syllables | 2 (from its American pronunciation) |
| In writing | 65 times per million words; the 1,636th most frequent word form |
| Wrong spellings searched | none measured in search |
| Pairs people search | |
| Rhymes with |
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); rhymes and same-letter words are computed by PlainSpell from its own word list.
How common is basis?
Basis appears 65 times per million words in written English, the 1,636th 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 basis?
- US /ˈbeɪ.sɪs/
- Australia /ˈbæɪ.sɪs/
Basis has 2 syllables (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: En-us-basis.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Words people confuse with basis
Word pairs people search, with the monthly searches for “a vs b” (G: Google, B: Bing, United States).
Sources: Google and Bing searches (September 2025 to August 2026, through DataForSEO); English Wiktionary (homophones, alternative spellings).
What rhymes with basis?
5 words on PlainSpell end in the same sounds as basis from its last stressed vowel (/eɪsɪs/):
Computed by PlainSpell from the pronunciations in the English Wiktionary (dump of September 2, 2026): a rhyme shares every sound from the last stressed vowel to the end; ordered by written frequency (wordfreq 3.1).
Forms of basis
- bases plural
- baseis plural, rare
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
What does basis mean?
The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).
noun
- 1
A physical base or foundation.
- 2
A starting point, base or foundation for an argument or hypothesis.
I wonder if the South Korean side has any basis that its smog is from China.
- 3
An underlying condition or circumstance.
Allow us to compete on an equal basis.
- 4
A regular frequency.
You should brush your teeth on a daily basis at minimum.
- 5
The difference between the cash price a dealer pays to a farmer for his produce and an agreed reference price, which is usually the futures price at which the given crop is trading at a commodity exchange.
Included in the basis could be elevation, cleaning, freight by truck and/or rail, government inspection fees, administration fees, interest and storage charges as well as allowance for risk and profit for the grain dealer.
- 6
In a vector space, a linearly independent set of vectors spanning the whole vector space.
- 7
Amount paid for an investment, including commissions and other expenses.
- 8
A collection of subsets ("basis elements") of a set, such that this collection covers the set, and for any two basis elements which both contain an element of the set, there is a third basis element contained in the intersection of the first two, which also contains that element.
The collection of all possible unions of basis elements of a basis is said to be the topology generated by that basis.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Basis in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
| Language | Words |
|---|---|
| German | Fundament , Basis, Grundlage |
| Spanish | basa, basamento, basis , fuste |
| French | base |
| Portuguese | base, fundamento |
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Translations are Wiktionary's, by sense; a linked word has its own PlainSpell page.
Where does basis come from?
From Latin basis, from Ancient Greek βάσις (básis), from Proto-Indo-European *gʷémtis, derived from Proto-Indo-European *gʷem- (whence also come). Doublet of base.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).