call in sick

verb

"call-in-sick" is a 10-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.

The verdict

“call in sick” is uncommon English (outside the top frequency list), classed as a verb. The kind of spelling people second-guess.

Unranked
below top-frequency English
12
letters

According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - To inform one's workplace or school that one temporarily cannot attend work or school due to illness.

Corpus desk

Index EN-call-in-sick · call in sick · English

call in sick · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables

  • FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
  • LEN-MEGA 12 letters
  • VOW-3 3 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 call in sick
PropertyValue
Headwordcall in sick
LanguageEnglish
Part of speechVerb
Letters12
Misspellings tracked0
Confusable pairs0
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Long-tail rank of “call in sick” in English

call in sicksits 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

call in sick is uncommon English outside the top frequency list, classed as averb. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "To inform one's workplace or school that one temporarily cannot attend work or school due to illness.".

Zero misspellings are on record for call in sick in our index, typically a sign the spelling maps closely to how the word sounds. No close-neighbour confusable shows up for this headword in our dataset, which tends to mean the word is visually distinctive enough to stand on its own.

No documented word history exists for this headword, leaving phoneme-to-grapheme mapping as the best guide to its spelling rather than a borrowing history. The correct English form is call in sick, spelled C-A-L-L- -I-N- -S-I-C-K.

Definition

  1. 1
    To inform one's workplace or school that one temporarily cannot attend work or school due to illness.

Recorded use

Wiktionary example

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

  1. "It only overloaded because of how low the power was when I fired! The guns are constantly being recharged tonight, and you should've called in sick back then!" "IT'S HARD TO CALL IN SICK WHEN ALL YOU CAN SAY IS 'MEOW'!"

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 "call in sick"?
"call in sick" is spelled C-A-L-L- -I-N- -S-I-C-K.
What does "call in sick" mean?
As a verb, "call in sick" means: To inform one's workplace or school that one temporarily cannot attend work or school due to illness.
What language does "call in sick" come from?
"call in sick" is a English word. PlainSpell covers definitions, pronunciations, and spelling data across English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and German.
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