cerulean
/səˈɹuːli.ən/
"cerulean" is a 8-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“cerulean” is uncommon English (frequency #66,550 among 5,599 “C” headwords), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- #66,550
- frequency rank, English
- 5,599
- “C” headwords
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - A greenish-blue color.
Corpus desk
Index EN-cerulean · cerulean · English
cerulean · rank #66,550 · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-RARE #66,550
- LEN-LONG 8 letters
- VOW-4 4 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-DENSE 5,599
- PHOTO-FINISH Cerf
Nearest frequency peer: Cerf (-1 rank slots)
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.
Long-tail ranks near “cerulean”
Sparse band: bars invert rank so rarer forms read shorter
- centerfold
centerfold
33,455 corpus weight
- centrale
centrale
33,453 corpus weight
- Cerf
Cerf
33,452 corpus weight
- cerulean
cerulean
33,451 corpus weight
- CFT
CFT
33,450 corpus weight
- chappie
chappie
33,447 corpus weight
What this shows Long-tail view: where “cerulean” sits against similarly uncommon English ranks.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | cerulean |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /səˈɹuːli.ən/ |
| Letters | 8 |
| Frequency rank | #66,550 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “cerulean” in English
Rare enough to double-check
cerulean is uncommon English at frequency #66,550 among 5,599 “C” headwords, classed as anoun, transcribed /səˈɹuːli.ən/. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 2 senses are on record.
The misspelling generator found no plausible variants for cerulean, and the word's spelling is regular enough that our generator found nothing worth flagging. Our dataset records no confusable match here, since nothing in our dataset looks or sounds close enough to cause mix-ups.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Latin caeruleus (“blue”) + -an, from caelum (“sky, heaven”) + -uleus (diminutive suffix). The correct English form is cerulean, spelled C-E-R-U-L-E-A-N.
Definition
- 1A greenish-blue color.
- 2Any of various lycaenid butterflies of the genus Jamides.
Recorded use
Wiktionary exampleThese source excerpts show how cerulean appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
For our blues we have the azures and ceruleans, lapis lazulis, the light and dusty, the powder blues, the deeps: royal, sapphire, navy, and marine […]
Etymology
From Latin caeruleus (“blue”) + -an, from caelum (“sky, heaven”) + -uleus (diminutive suffix).
This word in other languages
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
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Similar English words by spelling shape
Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "cerulean", not the corpus desk frequency band.
Same letter count
Frequency-ranked English headwords with 8 letters (nearest by frequency rank).