blind alley
"blind-alley" is a 10-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“blind alley” is uncommon English (outside the top frequency list), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency English
- 11
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see blind, alley. A street or passageway that leads nowhere.
Corpus desk
Index EN-blind-alley · blind alley · English
blind alley · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
- LEN-MEGA 11 letters
- VOW-4 4 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 | blind alley |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| Letters | 11 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “blind alley” in English
Rare enough to double-check
blind alley 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 misspelling variants are generated for blind alley in our index, a straightforward case of a spelling with little room for common typos. Our confusable-pair dataset has no match for it, since its spelling is unusual enough that it doesn't cluster with a lookalike.
Etymologically, the entry records: The notion of ‘blindness’ comes from the lack of a through passage (the ‘eye’). Attested since 1583, and used figuratively since the mid-19th century. The correct English form is blind alley, spelled B-L-I-N-D- -A-L-L-E-Y.
Definition
- 1Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see blind, alley. A street or passageway that leads nowhere.
- 2A course of inquiry that leads nowhere.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how blind alley appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
[Raheem] Sterling was grateful that a glaring miss from [Jesse] Lingard's pass was rescued by a linesman's flag against the Manchester United midfielder, but he almost tried too hard as the game progressed and was running up blind alleys before he was replaced by Marcus Rashford after 68 minutes.
"We looked into lots of blind alleys for re-engineering our fleet. […]."
Etymology
The notion of ‘blindness’ comes from the lack of a through passage (the ‘eye’). Attested since 1583, and used figuratively since the mid-19th century.
Synonyms
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.