chief
/t͡ʃiːf/
"chief" is a 5-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“chief” is in the everyday core of English, ranked #804 in English word frequency and used as a noun.
- #804
- frequency rank, English
- 5
- letters
- 7
- tracked misspellings
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - The leader or head of a tribe, organisation, business unit, or other group.
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 | chief |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /t͡ʃiːf/ |
| Letters | 5 |
| Frequency rank | #804 |
| Misspellings tracked | 7 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “chief” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for chief is 5 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /t͡ʃiːf/. Corpus data places it at rank #804 in overall English word frequency, putting it firmly in the everyday core of the language. Wiktionary records 6 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our generated misspelling index lists 7 likely wrong-spelling variants for chief, with forms such as "cchief", "cheif", and "chhief". 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, "CIF", "chip", "chin", and more, since the words sound or look close enough that writers reach for the wrong one mid-sentence.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English cheef, chef, from Old French chef, chief (“leader”), from Vulgar Latin capus, from Latin caput (“head”) (from which also captain, chieftain), from Proto-Italic *kaput, from Proto-Indo-European *káput. Doublet of cape (“point of land”), c… The correct English form is chief, spelled C-H-I-E-F.
Definition
- 1The leader or head of a tribe, organisation, business unit, or other group.
- 2Headship, the status of being a chief or leader.
- 3The top part of a shield or escutcheon; more specifically, an ordinary consisting of the upper part of the field cut off by a horizontal line, generally occupying the top third.
- 4The principal part or top of anything.
- 5An informal term of address.
- 6An informal term of address.
Etymology
From Middle English cheef, chef, from Old French chef, chief (“leader”), from Vulgar Latin capus, from Latin caput (“head”) (from which also captain, chieftain), from Proto-Italic *kaput, from Proto-Indo-European *káput. Doublet of cape (“point of land”), capo, caput, and chef through Latin (possibly also related to cape (“sleeveless garment”) and cap (“head covering”) from Latin cappa); doublet of head and Howth through Proto-Indo-European.
Synonyms
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: cchief,cheif,chhief,chieff,chife,cihef,hcief
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of chief - 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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Using “chief”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is C-H-I-E-F - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /t͡ʃiːf/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “CIF” - see the side-by-side comparison. chief vs CIF
- 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.