Clair
"clair" is a 5-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“Clair” is a moderately-common English word, ranked #20,062 in English word frequency and used as a proper noun.
- #20,062
- frequency rank, English
- 5
- letters
- 7
- tracked misspellings
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - A female given name from French.
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 | Clair |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Proper noun |
| Letters | 5 |
| Frequency rank | #20,062 |
| Misspellings tracked | 7 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “Clair” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for Clair is 5 letters long, classified as a proper noun. Corpus data places it at rank #20,062 in overall English word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it. Wiktionary records 4 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 Clair, with forms such as "calir", "cclair", and "clairr". 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, "clay", "clip", "clan", and more, a pairing that trips writers up because the two words share enough sound or shape to blur together.
Etymologically, the entry records: A less common spelling of Claire. The correct English form is Clair, spelled C-L-A-I-R.
Definition
- 1A female given name from French.
- 2A male given name transferred from the surname.
- 3A village in New Brunswick, Canada.
- 4A town in Saskatchewan, Canada.
Etymology
A less common spelling of Claire.
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: calir,cclair,clairr,clari,cliar,cllair,lcair
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of Clair - expressed in single-character edits (insert, delete, or swap one letter). Bigger bars stand out at a glance; a one-edit slip is the hardest to catch.
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 “Clair”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is C-L-A-I-R - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Don't mix it up with “clay” - see the side-by-side comparison. Clair vs clay
- 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.