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PlainSpell

caulk

/kɔk/noun, verb

caulk is spelled C-A-U-L-K: 5 letters and one syllable. It appears about once in every 5 million words in written English, the 67,454th most frequent word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). As a noun, caulk means “Caulking” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). The plural of caulk is caulks.

How many letters and syllables are in caulk?

Letters5: C-A-U-L-K
Syllables1 (from its American pronunciation)
In writingabout once in every 5 million words; the 67,454th most frequent word form
Wrong spellings searchednone measured in search
Pairs people search
Sounds like
Rhymes with

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 common is caulk?

Caulk appears about once in every 5 million words in written English, the 67,454th 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 caulk?

  • UK /kɔːk/
  • US /kɔk/
  • /kɑk/

Caulk has one syllable (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: En-gb-caulk.ogg, En-us-caulk.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).

Words people confuse with caulk

Word pairs people search, with the monthly searches for “a vs b” (G: Google, B: Bing, United States).

caulk vs cock0 B
caulk vs cork0 B

Sounds like: cork (Wiktionary's homophone list; some hold only in some accents).

Sources: Google and Bing searches (September 2025 to August 2026, through DataForSEO); English Wiktionary (homophones, alternative spellings).

What rhymes with caulk?

7 words on PlainSpell end in the same sounds as caulk from its last stressed vowel (/ɔk/):

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 caulk

  • caulks plural, present, singular, he/she/it
  • calk
  • caulking participle, present
  • caulked participle, past

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

What does caulk mean?

The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).

noun

  1. 1

    Caulking.

  2. 2

    A composition of vehicle and pigment used at ambient temperatures for filling/sealing joints or junctures, that remains elastic for an extended period of time after application.

  3. 3

    Alternative form of calk (“pointed projection on a horseshoe”).

  4. 4

    slangA short sleep; a nap.

verb

  1. 1

    To drive oakum into the seams of a ship's wooden deck or hull to make it watertight.

  2. 2

    To apply caulking to joints, cracks, or a juncture of different materials.

  3. 3

    slangTo copulate.

  4. 4

    slangTo take a short sleep; to nap.

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

Caulk in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese

LanguageWords
GermanDichtungsmasse (substance for filling and/or sealing), kalfatern, mit Dichtungsmasse abdichten (to seal joints with caulk)
Frenchcalfeutrer, étouper, calfater (to seal joints with caulk)
Portuguesecalafetar, selar, vedar (to seal joints with caulk)
Spanishenmasillar, calafatear (to seal joints with caulk)

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 caulk come from?

From Old Northern French cauquer, from Late Latin calicāre (“to fill in with limestone, caulk”), derived from calx (“limestone, chalk”). Related to calx, cauk, chalk, and calculus.

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

What to look up after caulk