bribery
/ˈbɹaɪbəɹi/
"bribery" is a 7-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“bribery” is a moderately-common English word, ranked #17,091 in English word frequency and used as a noun.
- #17,091
- frequency rank, English
- 7
- letters
- 11
- tracked misspellings
- 5
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - The act of giving an illegal payment (a bribe) to a person in an official position as a means of influencing their decisions.
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 | bribery |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /ˈbɹaɪbəɹi/ |
| Letters | 7 |
| Frequency rank | #17,091 |
| Misspellings tracked | 11 |
| Confusable pairs | 5 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “bribery” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for bribery is 7 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /ˈbɹaɪbəɹi/. Corpus data places it at rank #17,091 in overall English word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it. Wiktionary records 2 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our generated misspelling index lists 11 likely wrong-spelling variants for bribery, with forms such as "bbribery", "birbery", and "brbiery". Every one of these variants traces to a single-character edit -- an added or dropped letter, a swapped consonant, or a vowel swap -- the kind of slip a spell-checker is built to catch. It also participates in 5 confusable-pair relationships, "bribes", "bribe", "bribed", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Etymologically, the entry records: From bribe + -ery. The correct English form is bribery, spelled B-R-I-B-E-R-Y.
Definition
- 1The act of giving an illegal payment (a bribe) to a person in an official position as a means of influencing their decisions.
- 2The activity of offering, giving, or accepting such bribes.
Etymology
From bribe + -ery.
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: bbribery,birbery,brbiery,bribbery,briberry,briberyy,bribeyr,bribrey,briebry,brribery,rbibery
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of bribery - counted as single-character edits (an insertion, a deletion, or a substituted letter). The larger the bar, the easier the typo is to spot; one-edit slips are the ones that sneak past readers.
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
How do you spell "bribery"?
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Using “bribery”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is B-R-I-B-E-R-Y - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /ˈbɹaɪbəɹi/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “bribes” - see the side-by-side comparison. bribery vs bribes
- 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.