birdshot
"birdshot" is a 8-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“birdshot” is uncommon English (outside the top frequency list), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency English
- 8
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Small lead or steel shot, as pieces of ammunition, used in shotgun shells.
Corpus desk
Index EN-birdshot · birdshot · English
birdshot · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
- LEN-LONG 8 letters
- VOW-2 2 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-THIN "B" thin
- PHOTO-UNK Peer pending
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.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | birdshot |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| Letters | 8 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “birdshot” sits in English frequency
Rare enough to double-check
birdshot is uncommon English outside the top frequency list, classed as anoun. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 2 senses are on record.
No generated misspelling entries exist for birdshot in our index, a sign its spelling follows regular English conventions. Our confusable-pair dataset has no match for it, since nothing in our dataset looks or sounds close enough to cause mix-ups.
Etymologically, the entry records: From bird + shot. The correct English form is birdshot, spelled B-I-R-D-S-H-O-T.
Definition
- 1Small lead or steel shot, as pieces of ammunition, used in shotgun shells.
- 2A rifle or pistol cartridge containing small shot instead of a single larger projectile.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how birdshot appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
In the first shooting, four of the teenagers were sitting on a porch and were peppered with birdshot from a shotgun fired from a passing car around 2:30 p.m., Sheriff John Rutherford said.
“Eyes were hit by birdshot pellets and it was deliberate, they are shooting to kill,” said the Tehran doctor. A colleague added that they had removed “20 pellets” from the body of a single protester.
Etymology
From bird + shot.
Definitions, pronunciation, and etymology for this entry are drawn from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org structured extract (CC BY-SA). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.
PlainSpell is rendered directly from structured Wiktionary extracts and open word-frequency lists, no number is typed in by an editor. See our editorial standards & corrections policy, the methodology behind these numbers, or report a data error. Data current as of September 3, 2026. Primary sources: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) and FrequencyWords.
Frequently Asked Questions
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What to do next
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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.