drunken
/ˈdɹʌŋkən/
"drunken" is a 7-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“drunken” is a moderately-common English word, ranked #11,883 in English word frequency and used as a verb.
- #11,883
- frequency rank, English
- 7
- letters
- 11
- tracked misspellings
- 5
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - past participle of drink
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 | drunken |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Verb |
| IPA | /ˈdɹʌŋkən/ |
| Letters | 7 |
| Frequency rank | #11,883 |
| Misspellings tracked | 11 |
| Confusable pairs | 5 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “drunken” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for drunken is 7 letters long, classified as a verb, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /ˈdɹʌŋkən/. Corpus data places it at rank #11,883 in overall English word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it. The dominant gloss from Wiktionary reads: "past participle of drink".
Our generated misspelling index lists 11 likely wrong-spelling variants for drunken, with forms such as "ddrunken", "drnuken", and "drrunken". Each variant is a distinct typo pattern an edit-distance generator flags, typically a doubled-consonant error, a silent-letter drop, or a vowel substitution. It also participates in 5 confusable-pair relationships, "drunks", "drunkenly", "drunk", and more, since the words sound or look close enough that writers reach for the wrong one mid-sentence.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English drunken, ydronken, idrunken, from Old English druncen, ġedruncen (“drunk; drunken”), from Proto-Germanic *drunkanaz (“drunken”), past participle of Proto-Germanic *drinkaną (“to drink”), equivalent to drink + -en. Cognate with West Frisi… The correct English form is drunken, spelled D-R-U-N-K-E-N.
Definition
- 1past participle of drink
Etymology
From Middle English drunken, ydronken, idrunken, from Old English druncen, ġedruncen (“drunk; drunken”), from Proto-Germanic *drunkanaz (“drunken”), past participle of Proto-Germanic *drinkaną (“to drink”), equivalent to drink + -en. Cognate with West Frisian dronken (“drunk; drunken”), Dutch dronken (“drunk; drunken”), German betrunken (“drunk; drunken”), Swedish drucken (“drunk; drunken”).
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: ddrunken,drnuken,drrunken,druknen,drunekn,drunkenn,drunkken,drunkne,drunnken,durnken,rdunken
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of drunken - 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 “drunken”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is D-R-U-N-K-E-N - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /ˈdɹʌŋkən/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “drunks” - see the side-by-side comparison. drunken vs drunks
- 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.