CMC
"cmc" is a 3-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“CMC” sits in 20 confusable pairs (corpus #25,707) as a noun. The look-alike neighbours are the real trap.
- #25,707
- frequency rank, English
- 5,599
- “C” headwords
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Initialism of Commandant of the Marine Corps.
Corpus desk
Index EN-cmc · CMC · English
CMC · rank #25,707 · 0 variants · 20 confusables
- FREQ-MID #25,707
- LEN-MID 3 letters
- VOW-0 0 vowels
- CONFUS-HIGH 20 pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-DENSE 5,599
- PHOTO-FINISH clustered
Nearest frequency peer: clustered (-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.
Frequency neighbours of confusable “CMC”
Peers at similar corpus weight, separate from look-alike pairs below
- chronically
chronically
74,298 corpus weight
- cloths
cloths
74,296 corpus weight
- clustered
clustered
74,295 corpus weight
- CMC
CMC
74,294 corpus weight
- coherence
coherence
74,293 corpus weight
- complainant
complainant
74,291 corpus weight
What this shows Bars place “CMC” against nearest ranked English headwords, not a reprint of the confusable-pair desk.
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 | CMC |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| Letters | 3 |
| Frequency rank | #25,707 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Corpus rank beside confusables of “CMC”
Easy to mix with look-alikes
The spelling risk for CMC is neighbouring look-alikes ("co", "CT", …), not just typos; it is anoun. Frequency #25,707 among 5,599 “C” headwords. 7 recorded senses keep meaning in play.
CMC doesn't appear in our generated misspelling index, a sign its spelling follows regular English conventions. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "co", "CT", "CR", and more, a pairing that trips writers up because the two words share enough sound or shape to blur together.
This entry carries no recorded etymology, so its spelling is best explained by sound-to-letter mapping rather than etymology. The correct English form is CMC, spelled C-M-C.
Definition
- 1Initialism of Commandant of the Marine Corps.
- 2Initialism of computer-mediated communication.
- 3Initialism of complement mediated cytotoxicity.
- 4Initialism of Central Military Commission.
- 5Initialism of carboxymethylcellulose.
- 6Initialism of command master chief petty officer.
- 7Initialism of ceramic matrix composite
Recorded use
Wiktionary exampleThese source excerpts show how CMC appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
But on Saturday, China’s defence ministry announced that Zhang and Liu Zhenli, another CMC member, were under investigation for “suspected serious violations of discipline and law”, party-speak for corruption.
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
How do you spell "CMC"?
What does "CMC" mean?
What words are commonly confused with "CMC"?
What language does "CMC" come from?
Is PlainSpell free to use?
Similar English words by spelling shape
Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "CMC", not the corpus desk frequency band.
Same letter count
Frequency-ranked English headwords with 3 letters (nearest by frequency rank).