captain
/ˈkæp.tən/noun, verb
captain is spelled C-A-P-T-A-I-N. The wrong spelling people search most is captian: about 410 Bing searches a month in the United States (September 2025 to August 2026), about 1 in 32 of all searches for the word. Captain is a noun meaning “A chief or leader”. The plural of captain is captains.
How many letters and syllables are in captain?
| Letters | 7: C-A-P-T-A-I-N |
|---|---|
| Syllables | 2 (from its American pronunciation) |
| In writing | 78 times per million words; the 1,369th most frequent word form |
| Wrong spellings searched | 2; the most searched, captian, about 410 Bing searches a month (all of them) |
| Same letters |
Sources: letters and syllables from the English Wiktionary's hyphenation or pronunciation and the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary; written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media); Bing searches in the United States: the average month from September 2025 to August 2026 (Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, read September 30, 2026); rhymes and same-letter words are computed by PlainSpell from its own word list.
How do you spell captain?
Captain is spelled C-A-P-T-A-I-N. 2 wrong spellings are searched or written often enough to measure; together they are about 1 in 20 of the searches for captain in either form.
Bing searches in the United States: the average month from September 2025 to August 2026 (Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, read September 30, 2026). Wrong spellings are taken from Wiktionary entries tagged "misspelling" and its obsolete or nonstandard forms, Wikipedia's Lists of common misspellings and the codespell dictionary, then measured. The proofreader's marks show the change that corrects each one.
How common is captain?
Captain appears 78 times per million words in written English, the 1,369th most frequent word form in the list.
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
How do you pronounce captain?
- UK /ˈkæp.tɪn/
- UK /ˈkæp.tən/
- US /ˈkæp.tən/
Captain has 2 syllables (counted from its American pronunciation in the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary).
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: LL-Q1860_(eng)-Vealhurl-captain.wav, En-us-captain.ogg, LL-Q1860_(eng)-Back_ache-captain.wav, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
What rhymes with captain?
No other word on PlainSpell ends in the same sounds as captain (/æptən/).
Spelled with the same letters in another order: capitan.
Computed by PlainSpell from the pronunciations in the English Wiktionary (dump of September 2, 2026): a rhyme shares every sound from the last stressed vowel to the end; ordered by written frequency (wordfreq 3.1).
Forms of captain
- captains plural, present, singular, he/she/it
- captaining participle, present
- captained participle, past
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
What does captain mean?
The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).
noun
- 1
A chief or leader.
- 2
The person lawfully in command of a ship or other vessel.
The captain is the last man to leave a sinking ship.
- 3
An army officer with a rank between the most senior grade of lieutenant and major.
- 4
A naval officer with a rank between commander and commodore.
- 5
A commissioned officer in the United States Navy, Coast Guard, NOAA Corps, or PHS Corps of a grade superior to a commander and junior to a rear admiral (lower half). A captain is equal in grade or rank to a United States Army, Marine Corps, or Air Force colonel.
- 6
A rank qualifying an airline pilot to act as pilot in command of a two-pilot flight crew.
- 7
One of the athletes on a sports team who is designated to make decisions, and is allowed to speak for his team with a referee or official.
- 8
The leader of a group of workers.
John Henry said to the captain, "A man ain't nothing but a man."
verb
- 1
To act as captain
- 2
To exercise command of a ship, aircraft or sports team.
noun
- 1
The honorific of a captain, especially a ship's captain or a person with the military rank of captain.
These islands were discovered by Captain Cook.
- 2
Forms a title for a superhero seen as embodying or possessing in high degree the qualities associated with the ensuing phrase
Captain America; Captain Marvel; Captain Hindsight
- 3
Forms a title or nickname for a person; typically a nonce coinage
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How do you abbreviate captain?
Wiktionary records 3 abbreviations of captain: Capt, Cpt, capt.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Captain in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
| Language | Words |
|---|---|
| French | capitaine , capitaine de vaisseau , agir en capitaine, piloter |
| German | Stabshauptmann, Hauptmann , Kapitän zur See , Kapitän , Flugkapitän , Mannschaftskapitän |
| Portuguese | capitão , capitão de mar e guerra , pilotar , capitã |
| Spanish | capitán , pilotar , capitanear |
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Translations are Wiktionary's, by sense; a linked word has its own PlainSpell page.
Where does captain come from?
From Middle English capitain, capteyn, from Old French capitaine, from Late Latin capitāneus, from Latin caput (“head”) (English cap). Ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *kap-. Doublet of chieftain, also from Old French.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).