deer
/dɪɹ/noun
deer is spelled D-E-E-R: 4 letters and one syllable. It appears 13 times per million words in written English, the 5,878th most frequent word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). People search “dear vs deer” about 390 times a month (Google, United States). As a noun, deer means “A ruminant mammal with hooves and often antlers, of the family Cervidae, or one of several similar animals from related families of the order…” (English Wiktionary, September 2026).
How many letters and syllables are in deer?
| Letters | 4: D-E-E-R |
|---|---|
| Syllables | 1 (from its American pronunciation) |
| In writing | 13 times per million words; the 5,878th most frequent word form |
| Wrong spellings searched | none measured in search |
| Pairs people search | |
| Sounds like | |
| Rhymes with | |
| Same letters |
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); rhymes and same-letter words are computed by PlainSpell from its own word list.
How common is deer?
Deer appears 13 times per million words in written English, the 5,878th 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 deer?
- UK /dɪə/
- US /dɪɹ/
- /diːɹ/
Deer 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-deer.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Words people confuse with deer
Word pairs people search, with the monthly searches for “a vs b” (G: Google, B: Bing, United States).
Sounds like: dear (Wiktionary's homophone list; some hold only in some accents).
Also written: deere.
Sources: Google and Bing searches (September 2025 to August 2026, through DataForSEO); English Wiktionary (homophones, alternative spellings).
What rhymes with deer?
The 12 most written words on PlainSpell end in the same sounds as deer from its last stressed vowel (/ɪɹ/):
Spelled with the same letters in another order: reed, dere, rede, dree.
Computed by PlainSpell from the pronunciations in the English Wiktionary (dump of September 2, 2026): a rhyme shares every sound from the last stressed vowel to the end; ordered by written frequency (wordfreq 3.1).
What does deer mean?
The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).
noun
- 1
A ruminant mammal with hooves and often antlers, of the family Cervidae, or one of several similar animals from related families of the order Artiodactyla, such as the musk deer or mouse deer.
- 2
Such a mammal that is in the family Cervidae.
- 3
One of the smaller animals of the family Cervidae, distinguished from a moose or elk.
I wrecked my car after a deer ran across the road.
- 4
The meat of such an animal, obtained through the process of hunting or from specialized deer farms; venison.
I'd never had deer before I ate dinner with the Johanssens. In time I learned to like it; its gaminess is an acquired taste.
- 5
Any animal, especially a quadrupedal mammal as opposed to a bird, fish, etc.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Deer in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
In the sense animal of the family Cervidae:
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Translations are Wiktionary's, by sense; a linked word has its own PlainSpell page.
Where does deer come from?
From Middle English der, deer (“animal, deer”), from Old English dēor (“animal”), from Proto-West Germanic *deuʀ, from Proto-Germanic *deuzą, from Proto-Indo-European *dʰewsóm (“living thing”), from *dʰéws (“breath”), full-grade derivative of *dʰwes-.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).