cart
/kɑːt/
"cart" is a 4-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“cart” is a regularly-used English word, ranked #7,318 in English word frequency and used as a noun.
- #7,318
- frequency rank, English
- 4
- letters
- 6
- tracked misspellings
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - A small, open, wheeled vehicle, drawn or pushed by a person or animal, often with two wheels on one axle, more often used for transporting goods than passengers.
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 | cart |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /kɑːt/ |
| Letters | 4 |
| Frequency rank | #7,318 |
| Misspellings tracked | 6 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “cart” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for cart is 4 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /kɑːt/. Corpus data places it at rank #7,318 in overall English word frequency, indicating it appears regularly in written and spoken text. Wiktionary records 3 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 cart, with forms such as "acrt", "carrt", and "cartt". 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 20 confusable-pair relationships, "CT", "CR", "cut", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English cart, kart, from Old Norse kartr (“wagon; cart”), merged with native Old English cræt (“a chariot; cart”), from Proto-Germanic *krattaz, *krattijô, *kradō, from Proto-Indo-European *gret- (“tracery; wattle; cradle; cage; basket”), from *… The correct English form is cart, spelled C-A-R-T.
Definition
- 1A small, open, wheeled vehicle, drawn or pushed by a person or animal, often with two wheels on one axle, more often used for transporting goods than passengers.
- 2A small motor vehicle resembling a car; a go-cart.
- 3A shopping cart.
Etymology
From Middle English cart, kart, from Old Norse kartr (“wagon; cart”), merged with native Old English cræt (“a chariot; cart”), from Proto-Germanic *krattaz, *krattijô, *kradō, from Proto-Indo-European *gret- (“tracery; wattle; cradle; cage; basket”), from *ger- (“to turn, wind”). Cognate with West Frisian kret (“wheelbarrow for hauling dung”), Dutch krat, kret (“crate; wheelbarrow for hauling dung”), German Krätze (“basket; pannier”). Wider cognates include Sanskrit ग्रन्थ (grantha, “a binding”).
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: acrt,carrt,cartt,catr,ccart,crat
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of cart - 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 "cart"?
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Using “cart”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is C-A-R-T - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /kɑːt/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “CT” - see the side-by-side comparison. cart vs CT
- 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.