Basra
"basra" is a 5-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“Basra” is a moderately-common English word, ranked #38,747 in English word frequency and used as a proper noun.
- #38,747
- frequency rank, English
- 5
- letters
- 7
- tracked misspellings
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - A port city in southeastern Iraq.
Visual similarity to commonly confused words
How many letter changes separate each confused pair (Levenshtein distance, normalized).
Source: PlainSpell confusable corpus (Wiktionary, CC BY-SA).
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | Basra |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Proper noun |
| Letters | 5 |
| Frequency rank | #38,747 |
| Misspellings tracked | 7 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “Basra” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for Basra is 5 letters long, classified as a proper noun. Corpus data places it at rank #38,747 in overall English word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it. The dominant gloss from Wiktionary reads: "A port city in southeastern Iraq.".
Our generated misspelling index lists 7 likely wrong-spelling variants for Basra, with forms such as "absra", "barsa", and "basar". Each variant is a distinct typo pattern an edit-distance generator flags, typically a doubled-consonant error, a silent-letter drop, or a vowel substitution. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "bra", "BSA", "bass", and more, since the words sound or look close enough that writers reach for the wrong one mid-sentence.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Ottoman Turkish بصره (Basra) and Arabic البَصْرَة (al-Baṣra), from ال (al-, “the, land of the”) + بَصْرَة (baṣra, “overseer”). The correct English form is Basra, spelled B-A-S-R-A.
Definition
- 1A port city in southeastern Iraq.
Etymology
From Ottoman Turkish بصره (Basra) and Arabic البَصْرَة (al-Baṣra), from ال (al-, “the, land of the”) + بَصْرَة (baṣra, “overseer”).
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: absra,barsa,basar,basrra,bassra,bbasra,bsara
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of Basra - counted as single-character edits (an insertion, a deletion, or a substituted letter). The larger the bar, the easier the typo is to spot; one-edit slips are the ones that sneak past readers.
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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Using “Basra”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is B-A-S-R-A - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Don't mix it up with “bra” - see the side-by-side comparison. Basra vs bra
- Browse more English words and confusable pairs in the same reference. English words
Data Source
Wiktionary (via kaikki.org), licensed under CC BY-SA & GFDL. Word ordering uses an open word-frequency list; misspelling variants are generated by edit-distance from the correct headword.