Chicago
/ʃɪˈkɑː.ɡəʊ/
"chicago" is a 7-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“Chicago” has 10 generated spelling variants in the English index at frequency #1,556. The variants make it a useful spelling check.
- #1,556
- frequency rank, English
- 5,599
- “C” headwords
- 10
- tracked misspellings
- 3
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - A large city, the county seat of Cook County, in northeastern Illinois, United States, located on Lake Michigan.
Corpus desk
Index EN-chicago · Chicago · English
Chicago · rank #1,556 · 10 variants · 3 confusables
- FREQ-COMMON #1,556
- LEN-LONG 7 letters
- VOW-3 3 vowels
- CONFUS-LOW 3 pairs
- VAR-MID 10 variants
- BOOK-DENSE 5,599
- PHOTO-FINISH cent
Nearest frequency peer: cent (-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.
Rank peers near misspelling magnet “Chicago”
Same rarity band: useful when a typo lands on a peer headword
- brand
brand
98,448 corpus weight
- bus
bus
98,447 corpus weight
- cent
cent
98,446 corpus weight
- Chicago
Chicago
98,445 corpus weight
- count
count
98,444 corpus weight
- covered
covered
98,443 corpus weight
What this shows “Chicago” sits among these FrequencyWords peers; misspelling depth is tracked separately in the edit-distance chart.
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 | Chicago |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Proper noun |
| IPA | /ʃɪˈkɑː.ɡəʊ/ |
| Letters | 7 |
| Frequency rank | #1,556 |
| Misspellings tracked | 10 |
| Confusable pairs | 3 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Frequency seat of misspelling magnet “Chicago”
A misspelling magnet
The generator records 10 spelling variants around Chicago (IPA /ʃɪˈkɑː.ɡəʊ/), aproper noun. Corpus frequency is #1,556 among 5,599 “C” headwords. Dominant gloss: "A large city, the county seat of Cook County, in northeastern Illinois, United States, located on Lake Michigan.".
Our generated misspelling index lists 10 likely wrong-spelling variants for Chicago, with forms such as "cchicago", "chciago", and "chhicago". 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 3 confusable-pair relationships, "chico", "Chicano", "chica", where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Etymologically, the entry records: Etymology tree French Chécagoubor. English Chicago From French Chécagou, a transcription of Miami šikaakwa (“wild leek, ramp, Allium tricoccum; striped skunk”), from Proto-Algonquian *šeka·kwa; compare Ojibwe zhigaagawanzh / zhigaagawinzh (“onion, leek”), z… The correct English form is Chicago, spelled C-H-I-C-A-G-O.
Definition
- 1A large city, the county seat of Cook County, in northeastern Illinois, United States, located on Lake Michigan.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how Chicago appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
I am an American, Chicago born—Chicago, that somber city—and go at things as I have taught myself, free-style, and will make the record in my own way: first to knock, first admitted; sometimes an innocent knock, sometimes a not so innocent.
Chicago is now #1 in murder and sausages. That sounds like my kind of town!
Etymology
Etymology tree French Chécagoubor. English Chicago From French Chécagou, a transcription of Miami šikaakwa (“wild leek, ramp, Allium tricoccum; striped skunk”), from Proto-Algonquian *šeka·kwa; compare Ojibwe zhigaagawanzh / zhigaagawinzh (“onion, leek”), zhigaag (“striped skunk”). Doublet of skunk.
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as:
- cchicago
- chciago
- chhicago
- chiacgo
- chicaggo
- chicaog
- chiccago
- chicgao
- cihcago
- hcicago
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of Chicago - counted as single-character edits (an insertion, a deletion, or a substituted letter). The larger the bar, the easier the typo is to spot; one-edit slips are the ones that sneak past readers.
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 "Chicago", not the corpus desk frequency band.
Same letter count
Frequency-ranked English headwords with 7 letters (nearest by frequency rank).
Similar misspelling depth
Headwords with a similar count of attested misspellings (10 here; floor ≥5).