clay
/kleɪ/noun, verb
clay is spelled C-L-A-Y: 4 letters and one syllable. It appears 19 times per million words in written English, the 4,365th most frequent word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). As a noun, clay means “A mineral substance made up of small crystals of silica and alumina, that is ductile when moist; the material of pre-fired ceramics” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). The plural of clay is clays.
How many letters and syllables are in clay?
| Letters | 4: C-L-A-Y |
|---|---|
| Syllables | 1 (from its American pronunciation) |
| In writing | 19 times per million words; the 4,365th most frequent word form |
| Wrong spellings searched | none measured in search |
| Same letters |
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); rhymes and same-letter words are computed by PlainSpell from its own word list.
How common is clay?
Clay appears 19 times per million words in written English, the 4,365th 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 clay?
- /kleɪ/
- [kl̥eɪ]
Clay 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-us-clay.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
What rhymes with clay?
No other word on PlainSpell ends in the same sounds as clay.
Spelled with the same letters in another order: lacy, acyl.
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 clay
- clays plural, present, singular, he/she/it
- claying participle, present
- clayed participle, past
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
What does clay mean?
The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).
noun
- 1
A mineral substance made up of small crystals of silica and alumina, that is ductile when moist; the material of pre-fired ceramics.
- 2
An earth material with ductile qualities.
- 3
A tennis court surface made of crushed stone, brick, shale, or other unbound mineral aggregate.
The French Open is played on clay.
- 4
The material of the human body.
From clay we are made.
- 5
A particle less than 3.9 microns in diameter, following the Wentworth scale.
- 6
A clay pipe for smoking tobacco.
- 7
informalA clay pigeon.
We went shooting clays at the weekend.
- 8
Land or territory of a country or other political region, especially when subject to territorial claims.
Vilnius is rightful Polish clay.
verb
- 1
To add clay to, to spread clay onto.
- 2
To purify using clay.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Clay in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
| Language | Words |
|---|---|
| French | argile, glaise , terre battue |
| German | Lehm, Ton , Asche |
| Portuguese | argila , saibro |
| Spanish | arcilla, barro, argilla, alfar, greda, buro |
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 clay come from?
From Middle English cley, clay, from Old English clǣġ (“clay”), from Proto-West Germanic *klaij, from Proto-Germanic *klajjaz (“clay”), derived from Proto-Indo-European *gleyH- (“to glue, paste, stick together”).
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).