blay
noun
blay is spelled B-L-A-Y: 4 letters and one syllable. It appears about once in every 15 million words in written English, the 115,751st most frequent word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). As a noun, blay means “The bleak (fish)” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). The plural of blay is blays.
How many letters and syllables are in blay?
| Letters | 4: B-L-A-Y |
|---|---|
| Syllables | 1 (from its American pronunciation) |
| In writing | about once in every 15 million words; the 115,751st most frequent word form |
| Wrong spellings searched | none measured in search |
| Same letters |
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); rhymes and same-letter words are computed by PlainSpell from its own word list.
How common is blay?
Blay appears about once in every 15 million words in written English, the 115,751st 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 blay?
Blay has one syllable (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).
What rhymes with blay?
No other word on PlainSpell ends in the same sounds as blay.
Spelled with the same letters in another order: ably.
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 blay
- blays plural
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
What does blay mean?
The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).
noun
- 1
The bleak (fish).
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Where does blay come from?
From Middle English *blaye, *bleye, from Old English blǣġe (“blay, bleak, gudgeon”), from Proto-West Germanic *blaigijā, from Proto-Germanic *blaigijǭ (“blay, bleak, gudgeon”), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰleyk- (“to shine”). Cognate with West Frisian blei, Dutch blei, German Bleie, Bleihe (“blay”).
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).