device
/dɪˈvaɪs/noun
device is spelled D-E-V-I-C-E. The wrong spelling people search most is divice: about 70 Bing searches a month in the United States (September 2025 to August 2026), about 1 in 90 of all searches for the word. Device is a noun meaning “Any piece of equipment made for a particular purpose, especially a mechanical or electrical one”. The plural of device is devices.
How many letters and syllables are in device?
| Letters | 6: D-E-V-I-C-E |
|---|---|
| Syllables | 2 (from its American pronunciation) |
| In writing | 47 times per million words; the 2,153rd most frequent word form |
| Wrong spellings searched | 1; the most searched, divice, about 70 Bing searches a month (all of them) |
| Pairs people search | |
| Rhymes with |
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 do you spell device?
Device is spelled D-E-V-I-C-E. One wrong spelling is searched or written often enough to measure; together they are about 1 in 90 of the searches for device in either form.
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). Wrong spellings are taken from Wiktionary entries tagged "misspelling" and its obsolete or nonstandard forms, Wikipedia's Lists of common misspellings and the codespell dictionary, then measured. The proofreader's marks show the change that corrects each one.
How common is device?
Device appears 47 times per million words in written English, the 2,153rd 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 device?
- UK /dɪˈvaɪs/
- US /dɪˈvaɪs/
- [dɪˈvʌɪs]
Device has 2 syllables (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-device.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Words people confuse with device
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).
What rhymes with device?
9 words on PlainSpell end in the same sounds as device from its last stressed vowel (/aɪs/):
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).
Forms of device
- devices plural
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
What does device mean?
The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).
noun
- 1
Any piece of equipment made for a particular purpose, especially a mechanical or electrical one.
Near-synonyms: equipment, tool, machine
- 2
A peripheral device; an item of hardware.
- 3
A project or scheme, often designed to deceive; a stratagem; an artifice. 1602, Shakespeare, The Merry Wives of Windsor. "This is our device,/ That Falstaff at that oak shall meet with us."
- 4
IrelandAn improvised explosive device, home-made bomb
- 5
A technique that an author or speaker uses to evoke an emotional response in the audience; a rhetorical device.
- 6
A motto, emblem, or other mark used to distinguish the bearer from others. A device differs from a badge or cognizance primarily as it is a personal distinction, and not a badge borne by members of the same house successively.
- 7
archaicPower of devising; invention; contrivance.
- 8
An image used in whole or in part as a trademark or service mark.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How do you abbreviate device?
Wiktionary records one abbreviation of device: dev.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Device in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
| Language | Words |
|---|---|
| French | appareil, dispositif , stratagème, ruse, manœuvre, artifice |
| German | Gerät, Apparat, Einheit, Instrument, Baustein, Vorrichtung |
| Portuguese | aparelho, dispositivo, aparato , artifício |
| Spanish | dispositivo, mecanismo, aparejo |
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 device come from?
From Middle English devis, devise, devyce, devys, devyse, from Old French devis and devise, from Latin dīvīsus, past participle of dīvidō (“to divide”). Doublet of devise (noun).
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).