crib
/kɹɪb/
"crib" is a 4-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“crib” has 6 generated spelling variants in the English index at frequency #15,379. The variants make it a useful spelling check.
- #15,379
- frequency rank, English
- 5,599
- “C” headwords
- 6
- tracked misspellings
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - A baby’s bed with high, often slatted, often moveable sides, suitable for a child who has outgrown a cradle or bassinet.
Corpus desk
Index EN-crib · crib · English
crib · rank #15,379 · 6 variants · 20 confusables
- FREQ-MID #15,379
- LEN-MID 4 letters
- VOW-1 1 vowel
- CONFUS-HIGH 20 pairs
- VAR-MID 6 variants
- BOOK-DENSE 5,599
- PHOTO-FINISH corrosion
Nearest frequency peer: corrosion (-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.
Rank peers near misspelling magnet “crib”
Same rarity band: useful when a typo lands on a peer headword
- converse
converse
84,625 corpus weight
- correcting
correcting
84,624 corpus weight
- corrosion
corrosion
84,623 corpus weight
- crib
crib
84,622 corpus weight
- crossroads
crossroads
84,621 corpus weight
- dearly
dearly
84,620 corpus weight
What this shows “crib” sits among these FrequencyWords peers; misspelling depth is tracked separately in the edit-distance chart.
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 | crib |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /kɹɪb/ |
| Letters | 4 |
| Frequency rank | #15,379 |
| Misspellings tracked | 6 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Frequency seat of misspelling magnet “crib”
A misspelling magnet
The generator records 6 spelling variants around crib (IPA /kɹɪb/), anoun. Corpus frequency is #15,379 among 5,599 “C” headwords. Wiktionary lists 24 senses, so context still picks the gloss.
Our generated misspelling index lists 6 likely wrong-spelling variants for crib, with forms such as "ccrib", "cirb", and "crbi". 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 20 confusable-pair relationships, "cry", "Cub", "CSI", and more, a pairing that trips writers up because the two words share enough sound or shape to blur together.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English crib, cribbe, from Old English crib, cryb, cribb, crybb (“couch, bed; manger, stall”), from Proto-West Germanic *kribbjā, from Proto-Germanic *kribjǭ (“crib, wickerwork”), from Proto-Indo-European *grebʰ-, *gerbʰ- (“bunch, bundle, tuft, … The correct English form is crib, spelled C-R-I-B.
Definition
- 1A baby’s bed with high, often slatted, often moveable sides, suitable for a child who has outgrown a cradle or bassinet.
- 2A bed for a child older than a baby.
- 3A small sleeping berth in a packet or other small vessel.
- 4A wicker basket.
- 5A manger, a feeding trough for animals elevated off the earth or floor, especially one for fodder such as hay.
- 6The baby Jesus and the manger in a creche or nativity scene, consisting of statues of Mary, Joseph and various other characters such as the magi.
- 7A bin for drying or storing grain, such as a corn crib.
- 8A small room or covered structure, especially one of rough construction, used for storage or penning animals.
- 9A confined space, such as a cage or office cubicle.
- 10A job, a position; (British) an appointment.
- 11A hovel, a roughly constructed building best suited to the shelter of animals but used for human habitation.
- 12A boxy structure traditionally built of heavy wooden timbers, to support an existing structure from below, as with a mineshaft or a building being raised off its foundation in preparation for being moved; see cribbing.
- 13A collection of quotes or references for use in speaking, for assembling a written document, or as an aid to a project of some sort; a crib sheet.
- 14A minor theft, extortion or embezzlement, with or without criminal intent.
- 15The card game cribbage.
- 16The cards discarded by players and used by the dealer.
- 17A known piece of information corresponding to a section of encrypted text, that is then used to work out the remaining sections.
- 18A small holiday home, often near a beach and of simple construction.
- 19A snack or packed lunch, especially as taken to work to eat during a break.
- 20A small raft made of timber.
- 21The stomach.
- 22A literal translation, usually of a work originally in Latin or Ancient Greek.
- 23A cheat sheet or past test used by students; crib sheet.
- 24One’s residence, house or dwelling place, or usual place of resort.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how crib appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
In two minutes I was kneeling by the child’s crib, and Sandy was dispatching servants here, there, and everywhere, all over the palace. I took in the situation almost at a glance -- membranous croup!
a day or two afterwards I learned that Miss Temple, on returning to her own room at dawn, had found me laid in the little crib; my face against Helen Burns’s shoulder, my arms round her neck. I was asleep, and Helen was -- dead.
Etymology
From Middle English crib, cribbe, from Old English crib, cryb, cribb, crybb (“couch, bed; manger, stall”), from Proto-West Germanic *kribbjā, from Proto-Germanic *kribjǭ (“crib, wickerwork”), from Proto-Indo-European *grebʰ-, *gerbʰ- (“bunch, bundle, tuft, clump”), from *ger- (“to turn, twist”). Cognate with Saterland Frisian Kräbbe, Krääb, Krääf (“crib”), West Frisian krêbe (“crib”), Dutch krib (“crib, manger”), German Krippe (“rack, crib”), Danish krybbe (“crib”), Icelandic krubba (“crib”). Doublet of crèche. The sense of ‘stealing, taking notes, plagiarize’ seems to have developed out of the verb. The criminal sense may derive from the 'basket' sense, circa the mid 18th century, in that a poacher could conceal poachings in such a basket (see the 1772 Samuel Foote quotation). The cheating sense probably derives from the criminal sense.
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as:
- ccrib
- cirb
- crbi
- cribb
- crrib
- rcib
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of crib - measured in single-character edits (insert, delete, or substitute a letter). Larger bars are easier to catch; one-edit slips are the sneakiest.
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 "crib", not the corpus desk frequency band.
Same letter count
Frequency-ranked English headwords with 4 letters (nearest by frequency rank).
Similar misspelling depth
Headwords with a similar count of attested misspellings (6 here; floor ≥5).