Cameroon
/kæməˈɹuːn/
"cameroon" is a 8-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“Cameroon” is a moderately-common English word, ranked #14,289 in English word frequency and used as a proper noun.
- #14,289
- frequency rank, English
- 8
- letters
- 10
- tracked misspellings
- 1
- confusable pair
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - A country in Central Africa. Official name: Republic of Cameroon. Capital: Yaoundé. It also claims Ambazonia.
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 | Cameroon |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Proper noun |
| IPA | /kæməˈɹuːn/ |
| Letters | 8 |
| Frequency rank | #14,289 |
| Misspellings tracked | 10 |
| Confusable pairs | 1 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “Cameroon” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for Cameroon is 8 letters long, classified as a proper noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /kæməˈɹuːn/. Corpus data places it at rank #14,289 in overall English word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it. The dominant gloss from Wiktionary reads: "A country in Central Africa. Official name: Republic of Cameroon. Capital: Yaoundé. It also claims Ambazonia.".
Our generated misspelling index lists 10 likely wrong-spelling variants for Cameroon, with forms such as "acmeroon", "caemroon", and "cameoron". 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 1 confusable-pair relationship, "Cameron", a pairing that trips writers up because the two words share enough sound or shape to blur together.
Etymologically, the entry records: Borrowed from French Cameroun, from Portuguese Rio dos Camarões (“river of prawns”), a name given to the Wouri river estuary, in 1472 by the sailors of the Portuguese explorer Fernão do Pó (a.k.a. Fernando Pó), raving about the abundance of shrimps of the s… The correct English form is Cameroon, spelled C-A-M-E-R-O-O-N.
Definition
- 1A country in Central Africa. Official name: Republic of Cameroon. Capital: Yaoundé. It also claims Ambazonia.
Etymology
Borrowed from French Cameroun, from Portuguese Rio dos Camarões (“river of prawns”), a name given to the Wouri river estuary, in 1472 by the sailors of the Portuguese explorer Fernão do Pó (a.k.a. Fernando Pó), raving about the abundance of shrimps of the species Lepidophthalmus turneranus (the Cameroon ghost shrimp) in the river; camarão itself is from Latin cammarus (“lobster”), from Ancient Greek κάμμαρος (kámmaros, “a kind of lobster or shrimp”).
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: acmeroon,caemroon,cameoron,camerono,cameroonn,camerroon,cammeroon,camreoon,ccameroon,cmaeroon
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of Cameroon - 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
How do you spell "Cameroon"?
What does "Cameroon" mean?
What words are commonly confused with "Cameroon"?
How do you pronounce "Cameroon"?
What is the origin of the word "Cameroon"?
Is PlainSpell free to use?
Using “Cameroon”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is C-A-M-E-R-O-O-N - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /kæməˈɹuːn/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “Cameron” - see the side-by-side comparison. Cameroon vs Cameron
- 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.