colleague
col·league/ˈkɑliɡ/noun, verb
colleague is spelled C-O-L-L-E-A-G-U-E, 2 syllables: col·league. The wrong spelling people search most is collegue: about 1,560 Bing searches a month in the United States (September 2025 to August 2026), about 2 in 10 of all searches for the word. Colleague is a noun meaning “A fellow member of a profession, staff, academic faculty or other organization; an associate, a workmate”. The plural of colleague is colleagues.
How many letters and syllables are in colleague?
| Letters | 9: C-O-L-L-E-A-G-U-E |
|---|---|
| Syllables | 2: col·league |
| In writing | 9.5 times per million words; the 7,338th most frequent word form |
| Wrong spellings searched | 2; the most searched, collegue, about 1,560 Bing searches a month (all of them) |
Sources: letters and syllables from the English Wiktionary's hyphenation or pronunciation; written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media); Bing searches in the United States: the average month from September 2025 to August 2026 (Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, read September 30, 2026).
How do you spell colleague?
Colleague is spelled C-O-L-L-E-A-G-U-E. 2 wrong spellings are searched or written often enough to measure; together they are about 2 in 10 of the searches for colleague in either form.
Bing searches in the United States: the average month from September 2025 to August 2026 (Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, read September 30, 2026). Wrong spellings are taken from Wiktionary entries tagged "misspelling" and its obsolete or nonstandard forms, Wikipedia's Lists of common misspellings and the codespell dictionary, then measured. The proofreader's marks show the change that corrects each one.
How common is colleague?
Colleague appears 9.5 times per million words in written English, the 7,338th 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 colleague?
- UK /ˈkɒliːɡ/
- US /ˈkɑliɡ/
- Australia /ˈkɔliːɡ/
Colleague has 2 syllables, split col·league in writing.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: En-us-colleague.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Forms of colleague
- colleagues plural, present, singular, he/she/it
- colleaguing participle, present
- colleagued participle, past
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
What does colleague mean?
The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).
noun
- 1
A fellow member of a profession, staff, academic faculty or other organization; an associate, a workmate.
verb
- 1
To unite or associate with another or with others.
Young Fortinbras, Holding a weak supposal of our worth ...Colleagued with the dream of his advantage, ...hath not failed to pester us with message Importing the surrender of those lands Lost by his father. - Hamlet (Act I, Scene 2)
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Colleague in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
In the sense fellow member of a profession:
| Language | Words |
|---|---|
| French | collègue, confrère, consœur, confrèsœur |
| German | Kollege, Kollegin, Mitarbeiter, Mitarbeiterin |
| Portuguese | colega |
| Spanish | colega, compañero |
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 colleague come from?
From Middle French collegue, from Latin collēga (“a partner in office”), from com- (“with”) + lēgō (“to send on an embassy”), from lēx (“law”).
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).