clinging
/ˈklɪŋɪŋ/
"clinging" is a 8-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“clinging” is a moderately-common English word, ranked #18,040 in English word frequency and used as a verb.
- #18,040
- frequency rank, English
- 8
- letters
- 13
- tracked misspellings
- 9
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - present participle and gerund of cling
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 | clinging |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Verb |
| IPA | /ˈklɪŋɪŋ/ |
| Letters | 8 |
| Frequency rank | #18,040 |
| Misspellings tracked | 13 |
| Confusable pairs | 9 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “clinging” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for clinging is 8 letters long, classified as a verb, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /ˈklɪŋɪŋ/. Corpus data places it at rank #18,040 in overall English word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it. The dominant gloss from Wiktionary reads: "present participle and gerund of cling".
Our generated misspelling index lists 13 likely wrong-spelling variants for clinging, with forms such as "cclinging", "cilnging", and "cligning". Each of these forms differs from the correct spelling by one small edit: a doubled letter, a dropped silent letter, or a substituted vowel. It also participates in 9 confusable-pair relationships, "cloning", "coining", "clipping", and more, since the words sound or look close enough that writers reach for the wrong one mid-sentence.
Our source data has no etymology on file for this entry, so its spelling is easiest to reason about phoneme by phoneme, absent a documented history. The correct English form is clinging, spelled C-L-I-N-G-I-N-G.
Definition
- 1present participle and gerund of cling
Synonyms
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: cclinging,cilnging,cligning,clingging,clingign,clingingg,clinginng,clingnig,clinigng,clinnging,cllinging,clniging,lcinging
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of clinging - 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 “clinging”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is C-L-I-N-G-I-N-G - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /ˈklɪŋɪŋ/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “cloning” - see the side-by-side comparison. clinging vs cloning
- 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.