cons
/ˈkɑnz/noun, verb
cons is spelled C-O-N-S: 4 letters and one syllable. It appears 5.8 times per million words in written English, the 10,196th most frequent word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). People search “cons vs pros” about 720 times a month (Google, United States). As a noun, cons means “A data structure in Lisp that is a pair of pointers, car and cdr, used mainly for lists” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). The plural of cons is conses.
How many letters and syllables are in cons?
| Letters | 4: C-O-N-S |
|---|---|
| Syllables | 1 (from its American pronunciation) |
| In writing | 5.8 times per million words; the 10,196th most frequent word form |
| Wrong spellings searched | none measured in search |
| Pairs people search |
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); 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 common is cons?
Cons appears 5.8 times per million words in written English, the 10,196th 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 cons?
- /ˈkɑnz/
- /ˈkɑns/
Cons 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-cons.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Words people confuse with cons
Word pairs people search, with the monthly searches for “a vs b” (G: Google, B: Bing, United States).
Sources: Google and Bing searches (September 2025 to August 2026, through DataForSEO); English Wiktionary (homophones, alternative spellings).
Forms of cons
- conses plural, present, singular, he/she/it
- consing participle, present
- consed participle, past
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
What does cons mean?
The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).
noun
- 1
A data structure in Lisp that is a pair of pointers, car and cdr, used mainly for lists.
- 2
plural of con
verb
- 1
To obtain a list from a cons or a nesting of conses; to prepend an element to a list by forming a cons of that element and the list; to obtain a list from a smaller one by repeated application of such kind of prepending.
- 2
third-person singular simple present indicative of con
noun
- 1
plural of CON
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Where does cons come from?
Clipping of construct.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).