bleary
/ˈblɪəɹi/
"bleary" is a 6-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“bleary” is uncommon English (frequency #73,000 among 4,121 “B” headwords), classed as an adjective. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- #73,000
- frequency rank, English
- 4,121
- “B” headwords
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Tired, having senses dulled by exhaustion.
Corpus desk
Index EN-bleary · bleary · English
bleary · rank #73,000 · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-RARE #73,000
- LEN-LONG 6 letters
- VOW-3 3 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-MID 4,121
- PHOTO-FINISH Bisset
Nearest frequency peer: Bisset (-1 rank slots)
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.
Long-tail ranks near “bleary”
Sparse band: bars invert rank so rarer forms read shorter
- Birrell
Birrell
27,004 corpus weight
- Bishopsgate
Bishopsgate
27,003 corpus weight
- Bisset
Bisset
27,002 corpus weight
- bleary
bleary
27,001 corpus weight
- blockhead
blockhead
27,000 corpus weight
- blowup
blowup
26,998 corpus weight
What this shows Long-tail view: where “bleary” sits against similarly uncommon English ranks.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | bleary |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Adjective |
| IPA | /ˈblɪəɹi/ |
| Letters | 6 |
| Frequency rank | #73,000 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “bleary” in English
Rare enough to double-check
bleary is uncommon English at frequency #73,000 among 4,121 “B” headwords, classed as anadjective, transcribed /ˈblɪəɹi/. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "Tired, having senses dulled by exhaustion.".
Our edit-distance generator produced no likely misspellings for bleary, and the word's spelling is regular enough that our generator found nothing worth flagging. It is not paired with a close-neighbour confusable in our dataset, since its spelling is unusual enough that it doesn't cluster with a lookalike.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English blery, equivalent to blear + -y. Compare Old English bleriġ (“bald”). The correct English form is bleary, spelled B-L-E-A-R-Y.
Definition
- 1Tired, having senses dulled by exhaustion.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how bleary appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
Near-synonyms: exhausted, weary; see also Thesaurus:fatigued
"One of them can see you, and one of them can see an empty hallway." Reynders narrowed her bleary eyes — she wasn't wearing her glasses, for some reason — as though momentarily uncertain which sight she was seeing. She apparently decided in favour of their motley group. "I'm the one who can see you. The one who can see you can talk to you. The one who can…
Etymology
From Middle English blery, equivalent to blear + -y. Compare Old English bleriġ (“bald”).
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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Similar English words by spelling shape
Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "bleary", not the corpus desk frequency band.
Same letter count
Frequency-ranked English headwords with 6 letters (nearest by frequency rank).