commutator
"commutator" is a 10-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“commutator” is uncommon English (frequency #80,335 among 5,599 “C” headwords), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- #80,335
- frequency rank, English
- 5,599
- “C” headwords
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - An electrical switch, in a generator or motor, that periodically reverses the direction of an electric current.
Corpus desk
Index EN-commutator · commutator · English
commutator · rank #80,335 · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-RARE #80,335
- LEN-MEGA 10 letters
- VOW-4 4 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-DENSE 5,599
- PHOTO-FINISH compactly
Nearest frequency peer: compactly (+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.
Long-tail ranks near “commutator”
Sparse band: bars invert rank so rarer forms read shorter
- cohomology
cohomology
19,671 corpus weight
- commandery
commandery
19,669 corpus weight
- communalism
communalism
19,668 corpus weight
- commutator
commutator
19,666 corpus weight
- compactly
compactly
19,665 corpus weight
- congratz
congratz
19,662 corpus weight
What this shows Long-tail view: where “commutator” sits against similarly uncommon English ranks.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | commutator |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| Letters | 10 |
| Frequency rank | #80,335 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “commutator” in English
Rare enough to double-check
commutator is uncommon English at frequency #80,335 among 5,599 “C” headwords, classed as anoun. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 3 senses are on record.
The misspelling generator found no plausible variants for commutator, since its letter pattern doesn't lend itself to common typo substitutions. Our confusable-pair dataset has no match for it, since nothing in our dataset looks or sounds close enough to cause mix-ups.
Etymologically, the entry records: Back-formation from commutation (in the late 19th century), as is commutate (verb) too. The correct English form is commutator, spelled C-O-M-M-U-T-A-T-O-R.
Definition
- 1An electrical switch, in a generator or motor, that periodically reverses the direction of an electric current.
- 2A binary map in a given group G, given by [g, h] = ghg⁻¹h⁻¹, where g and h are elements of G, which yields the group's identity if and only if the group operation commutes for g and h.
- 3A binary map in a given ring R, given by [a, b] = ab − ba, where a and b are elements of R, which yields the ring's zero element if and only if the multiplication operation commutes for a and b.
Etymology
Back-formation from commutation (in the late 19th century), as is commutate (verb) too.
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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Similar English words by spelling shape
Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "commutator", not the corpus desk frequency band.
Same letter count
Frequency-ranked English headwords with 10 letters (nearest by frequency rank).