distress
/dɪˈstɹɛs/
"distress" is a 8-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“distress” is a regularly-used English word, ranked #7,675 in English word frequency and used as a noun.
- #7,675
- frequency rank, English
- 8
- letters
- 11
- tracked misspellings
- 3
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - Physical or emotional discomfort, suffering, or alarm, particularly of a more acute nature.
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 | distress |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /dɪˈstɹɛs/ |
| Letters | 8 |
| Frequency rank | #7,675 |
| Misspellings tracked | 11 |
| Confusable pairs | 3 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “distress” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for distress is 8 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /dɪˈstɹɛs/. Corpus data places it at rank #7,675 in overall English word frequency, indicating it appears regularly in written and spoken text. Wiktionary records 6 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 distress, with forms such as "ddistress", "disrtess", and "disstress". Each of these forms differs from the correct spelling by one small edit: a doubled letter, a dropped silent letter, or a substituted vowel. It also participates in 3 confusable-pair relationships, "distrust", "distressed", "digress", since the words sound or look close enough that writers reach for the wrong one mid-sentence.
Etymologically, the entry records: The verb is from Middle English distressen, from Old French destrecier (“to restrain, constrain, put in straits, afflict, distress”); compare French détresse. Ultimately from Medieval Latin as if *districtiō, an assumed frequentative form of Latin distringō… The correct English form is distress, spelled D-I-S-T-R-E-S-S.
Definition
- 1Physical or emotional discomfort, suffering, or alarm, particularly of a more acute nature.
- 2A cause of such discomfort.
- 3Serious danger.
- 4An aversive state of stress to which a person cannot fully adapt.
- 5A seizing of property without legal process to force payment of a debt.
- 6The thing taken by distraining; that which is seized to procure satisfaction.
Etymology
The verb is from Middle English distressen, from Old French destrecier (“to restrain, constrain, put in straits, afflict, distress”); compare French détresse. Ultimately from Medieval Latin as if *districtiō, an assumed frequentative form of Latin distringō (“to pull asunder, stretch out”), from dis- (“apart”) + stringō (“to draw tight, strain”). The noun is from Middle English distresse, from Old French destrece, ultimately also from Latin distringō.
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: ddistress,disrtess,disstress,disterss,distres,distrress,distrses,disttress,ditsress,dsitress,idstress
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of distress - 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 “distress”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is D-I-S-T-R-E-S-S - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /dɪˈstɹɛs/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “distrust” - see the side-by-side comparison. distress vs distrust
- 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.