efficient
/ɪˈfɪʃənt/adjective
efficient is spelled E-F-F-I-C-I-E-N-T. The wrong spelling people search most is efficent: about 570 Bing searches a month in the United States (September 2025 to August 2026), about 1 in 11 of all searches for the word. Efficient is an adjective meaning “Making good, thorough, or careful use of resources; not consuming extra. Especially, making good use of time…”.
How many letters and syllables are in efficient?
| Letters | 9: E-F-F-I-C-I-E-N-T |
|---|---|
| Syllables | 3 (from its American pronunciation) |
| In writing | 26 times per million words; the 3,479th most frequent word form |
| Wrong spellings searched | 2; the most searched, efficent, about 570 Bing searches a month (all of them) |
| 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 efficient?
Efficient is spelled E-F-F-I-C-I-E-N-T. 2 wrong spellings are searched or written often enough to measure; together they are about 1 in 10 of the searches for efficient 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 efficient?
Efficient appears 26 times per million words in written English, the 3,479th 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 efficient?
- UK /ɪˈfɪʃənt/
- US /ɪˈfɪʃənt/
- US /əˈfɪʃənt/
Efficient has 3 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-efficient.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
What rhymes with efficient?
3 words on PlainSpell end in the same sounds as efficient from its last stressed vowel (/ɪʃənt/):
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 efficient
- more efficient comparative
- most efficient superlative
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
What does efficient mean?
The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).
adjective
- 1
Making good, thorough, or careful use of resources; not consuming extra. Especially, making good use of time or energy.
An efficient process would automate all the routine work.
- 2
Expressing the proportion of consumed energy that was successfully used in a process; the ratio of useful output to total input.
The motor is only 20% efficient at that temperature.
- 3
Causing effects, producing results; bringing into being; initiating change (rare except in philosophical and legal expression efficient cause = causative factor or agent).
Ownership, maintenance, or use of the automobile need not be the direct and efficient cause of the injury sustained
- 4
proscribedeffective, efficacious
noun
- 1
obsoleteA cause; something that causes an effect.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Efficient in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
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 efficient come from?
1398, “making,” from Old French, from Latin efficientem, nominative efficiēns, participle of efficere (“work out, accomplish”) (see effect). Meaning “productive, skilled” is from 1787. Efficiency apartment is first recorded 1930, American English.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).