boil
/bɔɪ(ə)l/
"boil" is a 4-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“boil” is a regularly-used English word, ranked #9,139 in English word frequency and used as a noun.
- #9,139
- frequency rank, English
- 4
- letters
- 5
- tracked misspellings
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - A localized accumulation of pus in the skin, resulting from infection.
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 | boil |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /bɔɪ(ə)l/ |
| Letters | 4 |
| Frequency rank | #9,139 |
| Misspellings tracked | 5 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “boil” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for boil is 4 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /bɔɪ(ə)l/. Corpus data places it at rank #9,139 in overall English word frequency, indicating it appears regularly in written and spoken text. The dominant gloss from Wiktionary reads: "A localized accumulation of pus in the skin, resulting from infection.".
Our generated misspelling index lists 5 likely wrong-spelling variants for boil, with forms such as "bboil", "biol", and "boill". Each of these forms differs from the correct spelling by one small edit: a doubled letter, a dropped silent letter, or a substituted vowel. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "boy", "box", "bow", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English bile, büle (“boil, tumor”), from Old English bȳl, bȳle (“boil, swelling”), from Proto-Germanic *būlijō, *būlō (“boil”). Akin to Dutch buil (“boil, swelling”), German Beule (“boil, hump”), Icelandic beyla (“swelling, hump”). The expected … The correct English form is boil, spelled B-O-I-L.
Definition
- 1A localized accumulation of pus in the skin, resulting from infection.
Etymology
From Middle English bile, büle (“boil, tumor”), from Old English bȳl, bȳle (“boil, swelling”), from Proto-Germanic *būlijō, *būlō (“boil”). Akin to Dutch buil (“boil, swelling”), German Beule (“boil, hump”), Icelandic beyla (“swelling, hump”). The expected form is bile; the rounding of the diphthong could be caused by the initial b- and/or by association with etymology 2.
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: bboil,biol,boill,boli,obil
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of boil - measured in single-character edits (insert, delete, or substitute a letter). Larger bars are easier to catch; one-edit slips are the sneakiest.
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 “boil”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is B-O-I-L - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /bɔɪ(ə)l/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “boy” - see the side-by-side comparison. boil vs boy
- 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.