cabin fever

noun

"cabin-fever" is a 10-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.

The verdict

“cabin fever” 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) - A condition of restlessness and irritability caused by being in a confined space.

Corpus desk

Index EN-cabin-fever · cabin fever · English

cabin fever · 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 "C" 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.

Key facts for cabin fever
PropertyValue
Headwordcabin fever
LanguageEnglish
Part of speechNoun
Letters11
Misspellings tracked0
Confusable pairs0
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Long-tail rank of “cabin fever” in English

cabin feversits beyond the 100,000 most-frequent English words, in the long tail of technical, archaic, or otherwise rare vocabulary where spelling doubt tends to strike hardest.

Beyond rank #100,000. Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list.

Rare enough to double-check

cabin fever is uncommon English outside the top frequency list, classed as anoun. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 2 senses are on record.

cabin fever doesn't appear in our generated misspelling index, a straightforward case of a spelling with little room for common typos. No close-neighbour confusable shows up for this headword in our dataset, since its spelling is unusual enough that it doesn't cluster with a lookalike.

Etymologically, the entry records: In the current sense coined or popularized in a novel of the same name in 1918. See cite below. The correct English form is cabin fever, spelled C-A-B-I-N- -F-E-V-E-R.

Definition

  1. 1
    A condition of restlessness and irritability caused by being in a confined space.
  2. 2
    Typhus.

Recorded use

Wiktionary examples

These source excerpts show how cabin fever appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.

  1. Some residents of Alaska suffer from cabin fever when they remain indoors throughout the long, snowy winters.
  2. Just as the body fed too long upon meat becomes a prey to that horrid disease called scurvy, so the mind fed too long upon monotony succumbs to the insidious mental ailment which the West calls "cabin fever."

Etymology

In the current sense coined or popularized in a novel of the same name in 1918. See cite below.

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). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.

Frequently Asked Questions

How do you spell "cabin fever"?
"cabin fever" is spelled C-A-B-I-N- -F-E-V-E-R.
What does "cabin fever" mean?
As a noun, "cabin fever" means: A condition of restlessness and irritability caused by being in a confined space.
What is the origin of the word "cabin fever"?
In the current sense coined or popularized in a novel of the same name in 1918. See cite below. See the full etymology section above for more details.
Is PlainSpell free to use?
Yes, PlainSpell is a completely free word reference. You can look up definitions, pronunciations, confusable pairs, homophones, and spelling corrections across 5 languages without any sign-up or subscription.

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list