creature
/ˈkɹiː.tʃə/
"creature" is a 8-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“creature” is a regularly-used English word, ranked #5,488 in English word frequency and used as a noun.
- #5,488
- frequency rank, English
- 8
- letters
- 11
- tracked misspellings
- 6
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - A living being, such as an animal, monster, or alien.
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 | creature |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /ˈkɹiː.tʃə/ |
| Letters | 8 |
| Frequency rank | #5,488 |
| Misspellings tracked | 11 |
| Confusable pairs | 6 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “creature” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for creature is 8 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /ˈkɹiː.tʃə/. Corpus data places it at rank #5,488 in overall English word frequency, indicating it appears regularly in written and spoken text. Wiktionary records 5 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our generated misspelling index lists 11 likely wrong-spelling variants for creature, with forms such as "ccreature", "cerature", and "craeture". Every one of these variants traces to a single-character edit -- an added or dropped letter, a swapped consonant, or a vowel swap -- the kind of slip a spell-checker is built to catch. It also participates in 6 confusable-pair relationships, "creatures", "curvature", "create", and more, since the words sound or look close enough that writers reach for the wrong one mid-sentence.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English creature in the original sense of “a created thing”, borrowed via Old French creature, criature, from Latin creātūra, from creō. Displaced native Old English ġesċeaft. Doublet of craythur and critter. The correct English form is creature, spelled C-R-E-A-T-U-R-E.
Definition
- 1A living being, such as an animal, monster, or alien.
- 2An unidentified, mysterious, and often monstrous animal or being.
- 3A human.
- 4A created thing, whether animate or inanimate; a creation.
- 5A being subservient to or dependent upon another.
Etymology
From Middle English creature in the original sense of “a created thing”, borrowed via Old French creature, criature, from Latin creātūra, from creō. Displaced native Old English ġesċeaft. Doublet of craythur and critter.
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: ccreature,cerature,craeture,creatrue,creatture,creatuer,creaturre,creautre,cretaure,crreature,rceature
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of creature - 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 “creature”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is C-R-E-A-T-U-R-E - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /ˈkɹiː.tʃə/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “creatures” - see the side-by-side comparison. creature vs creatures
- 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.