brow
/bɹaʊ/
"brow" is a 4-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“brow” is a moderately-common English word, ranked #13,874 in English word frequency and used as a noun.
- #13,874
- frequency rank, English
- 4
- letters
- 6
- tracked misspellings
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - The bony ridge over the eyes, upon which the eyebrows are located.
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 | brow |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /bɹaʊ/ |
| Letters | 4 |
| Frequency rank | #13,874 |
| Misspellings tracked | 6 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “brow” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for brow is 4 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /bɹaʊ/. Corpus data places it at rank #13,874 in overall English word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it. Wiktionary records 9 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our generated misspelling index lists 6 likely wrong-spelling variants for brow, with forms such as "bbrow", "borw", and "broww". Each variant is a distinct typo pattern an edit-distance generator flags, typically a doubled-consonant error, a silent-letter drop, or a vowel substitution. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "BW", "BTW", "bru", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English browe, from Old English brū, from Proto-West Germanic *brāwu, from Proto-Germanic *brūwō, from Proto-Indo-European *h₃bʰrúHs (“brow”). Cognate with Scots broo (“brow”), Dutch brauw (“brow”), German Braue (“eyebrow”), Danish, Norwegian Ny… The correct English form is brow, spelled B-R-O-W.
Definition
- 1The bony ridge over the eyes, upon which the eyebrows are located.
- 2The eyebrow.
- 3The forehead.
- 4Aspect; appearance; facial expression.
- 5The projecting upper edge of a steep place such as a hill.
- 6The first tine of an antler's beam.
- 7A gallery in a coal mine running across the face of the coal.
- 8The gangway from ship to shore when a ship is lying alongside a quay.
- 9The hinged part of a landing craft or ferry which is lowered to form a landing platform; a ramp.
Etymology
From Middle English browe, from Old English brū, from Proto-West Germanic *brāwu, from Proto-Germanic *brūwō, from Proto-Indo-European *h₃bʰrúHs (“brow”). Cognate with Scots broo (“brow”), Dutch brauw (“brow”), German Braue (“eyebrow”), Danish, Norwegian Nynorsk and Swedish bryn (“brow”), Faroese, Icelandic brún (“brow”). See also Middle Irish brúad, Tocharian B pärwāne (“eyebrows”), Lithuanian bruvi̇̀s, Serbo-Croatian obrva (“eyebrow”), Russian бровь (brovʹ, “brow”), Ancient Greek ὀφρύς (ophrús, “eyebrow”), Sanskrit भ्रू (bhrū, “eyebrow”)), Persian ابرو (abru, “eyebrow”), Khowar بروُ (bruú, “eyebrow”).
Synonyms
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: bbrow,borw,broww,brrow,brwo,rbow
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of brow - 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 “brow”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is B-R-O-W - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /bɹaʊ/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “BW” - see the side-by-side comparison. brow vs BW
- 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.