doleful
/ˈdoʊlfəl/
"doleful" is a 7-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“doleful” is uncommon English (outside the top frequency list), classed as an adjective. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency English
- 7
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Filled with grief, mournful, bringing feelings of sadness.
Corpus desk
Index EN-doleful · doleful · English
doleful · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
- LEN-LONG 7 letters
- VOW-3 3 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-THIN "D" thin
- PHOTO-UNK Peer pending
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.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | doleful |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Adjective |
| IPA | /ˈdoʊlfəl/ |
| Letters | 7 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “doleful” in English
Rare enough to double-check
doleful is uncommon English outside the top frequency list, classed as anadjective, transcribed /ˈdoʊlfəl/. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "Filled with grief, mournful, bringing feelings of sadness.".
Our edit-distance generator produced no likely misspellings for doleful, a sign its spelling follows regular English conventions. This entry stands alone in our confusable dataset, a sign it's visually distinctive enough not to be mixed up with another word.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English doleful, doolful, deolful, equivalent to dole + -ful. The correct English form is doleful, spelled D-O-L-E-F-U-L.
Definition
- 1Filled with grief, mournful, bringing feelings of sadness.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how doleful appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
The doleful peal of the bell indicated another funeral was being held.
A doleful expression that tugged at my heartstrings.
Etymology
From Middle English doleful, doolful, deolful, equivalent to dole + -ful.
This word in other languages
Definitions, pronunciation, and etymology for this entry are drawn from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org structured extract (CC BY-SA). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.