death
/dɛθ/
"death" is a 5-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“death” has 7 generated spelling variants in the English index at frequency #385. The variants make it a useful spelling check.
- #385
- frequency rank, English
- 3,470
- “D” headwords
- 7
- tracked misspellings
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - The cessation of life and all associated processes; the end of an organism's existence as an entity independent from its environment and its return to an inert, nonliving state.
Corpus desk
Index EN-death · death · English
death · rank #385 · 7 variants · 20 confusables
- FREQ-CORE #385
- LEN-MID 5 letters
- VOW-2 2 vowels
- CONFUS-HIGH 20 pairs
- VAR-MID 7 variants
- BOOK-MID 3,470
- PHOTO-FINISH control
Nearest frequency peer: control (-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 “death”
Same rarity band: useful when a typo lands on a peer headword
- body
body
99,619 corpus weight
- coming
coming
99,618 corpus weight
- control
control
99,617 corpus weight
- death
death
99,616 corpus weight
- food
food
99,615 corpus weight
- guy
guy
99,614 corpus weight
What this shows “death” 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 | death |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /dɛθ/ |
| Letters | 5 |
| Frequency rank | #385 |
| Misspellings tracked | 7 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Frequency seat of misspelling magnet “death”
A misspelling magnet
The generator records 7 spelling variants around death (IPA /dɛθ/), anoun. Corpus frequency is #385 among 3,470 “D” headwords. Wiktionary lists 6 senses, so context still picks the gloss.
Our generated misspelling index lists 7 likely wrong-spelling variants for death, with forms such as "daeth", "ddeath", and "deaht". 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, "debt", "dent", "doth", 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 deeth, from Old English dēaþ, from Proto-West Germanic *dauþu, from Proto-Germanic *dauþuz, from Proto-Indo-European *dʰówtus. More at die. Cognates Cognate with Scots daeth, daith, death, deeth, deith (“death”), North Frisian Duar, duas… The correct English form is death, spelled D-E-A-T-H.
Definition
- 1The cessation of life and all associated processes; the end of an organism's existence as an entity independent from its environment and its return to an inert, nonliving state.
- 2The cessation of life and all associated processes; the end of an organism's existence as an entity independent from its environment and its return to an inert, nonliving state.
- 3The personification of death as a (usually male) hooded figure with a scythe; the Grim Reaper.
- 4The collapse or end of something.
- 5The collapse or end of something.
- 6Spiritual lifelessness.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how death appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
My grandfather died a violent death, which saddened the whole family.
But foraſmuch as this [the faintneſs of the Heart] is a very bad and heavy diſtemper, and a fore-runner of death, therefore 'tis called a timely death.
Etymology
From Middle English deeth, from Old English dēaþ, from Proto-West Germanic *dauþu, from Proto-Germanic *dauþuz, from Proto-Indo-European *dʰówtus. More at die. Cognates Cognate with Scots daeth, daith, death, deeth, deith (“death”), North Frisian Duar, duas, düüs (“death”), Saterland Frisian Dood (“death”), West Frisian dea (“death”), Dutch dood (“death”), German Tod, Todt (“death”), Limburgish doead (“death”), Luxembourgish Doud (“death”), Yiddish טויט (toyt, “death”), Danish, Norwegian Bokmål død (“death”), Faroese deyði (“death”), Icelandic dauði (“death”), Norwegian Nynorsk daude, død (“death”), Swedish död (“death”), Gothic 𐌳𐌰𐌿𐌸𐌿𐍃 (dauþus, “death”).
Synonyms
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as:
- daeth
- ddeath
- deaht
- deathh
- deatth
- detah
- edath
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of death - 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 "death", not the corpus desk frequency band.
Same letter count
Frequency-ranked English headwords with 5 letters (nearest by frequency rank).
Similar misspelling depth
Headwords with a similar count of attested misspellings (7 here; floor ≥5).