bi
/baɪ/
"bi" is a 2-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“bi” is a regularly-used English word, ranked #6,656 in English word frequency and used as an adjective.
- #6,656
- frequency rank, English
- 2
- letters
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - Clipping of bisexual.
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 | bi |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Adjective |
| IPA | /baɪ/ |
| Letters | 2 |
| Frequency rank | #6,656 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “bi” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for bi is 2 letters long, classified as an adjective, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /baɪ/. Corpus data places it at rank #6,656 in overall English word frequency, indicating it appears regularly in written and spoken text. Wiktionary records 2 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
bi doesn't appear in our generated misspelling index, a straightforward case of a spelling with little room for common typos. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "by", "BS", "bo", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Our source data has no etymology on file for this entry, so its spelling is easiest to reason about phoneme by phoneme, absent a documented history. The correct English form is bi, spelled B-I.
Definition
- 1Clipping of bisexual.
- 2Clipping of bigender.
This word in other languages
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 “bi”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is B-I - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /baɪ/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “by” - see the side-by-side comparison. bi vs by
- 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.