electronic mail

noun

"electronic-mail" is a 14-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.

The verdict

“electronic mail” is uncommon English (outside the top frequency list), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.

Unranked
below top-frequency English
15
letters

According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Email (the system).

Corpus desk

Index EN-electronic-mail · electronic mail · English

electronic mail · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables

  • FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
  • LEN-MEGA 15 letters
  • VOW-6 6 vowels
  • CONFUS-0 No pairs
  • VAR-0 0 variants
  • BOOK-THIN "E" 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.

Key facts for electronic mail
PropertyValue
Headwordelectronic mail
LanguageEnglish
Part of speechNoun
Letters15
Misspellings tracked0
Confusable pairs0
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Long-tail rank of “electronic mail” in English

electronic mailsits beyond the 100,000 most-frequent English words, in the long tail of technical, archaic, or otherwise rare vocabulary where spelling doubt tends to strike hardest.

Beyond rank #100,000. Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list.

Rare enough to double-check

electronic mail is uncommon English outside the top frequency list, classed as anoun. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 2 senses are on record.

The misspelling generator found no plausible variants for electronic mail, which points to an orthography that plays by predictable English rules. This entry stands alone in our confusable dataset, since nothing in our dataset looks or sounds close enough to cause mix-ups.

No documented word history exists for this headword, so its spelling pattern is best understood through pronunciation rather than a traceable origin. The correct English form is electronic mail, spelled E-L-E-C-T-R-O-N-I-C- -M-A-I-L.

Definition

  1. 1
    Email (the system).
  2. 2
    An email.

Recorded use

Wiktionary examples

These source excerpts show how electronic mail appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.

  1. Electronic mail is the single most visible application of distributed computing today.
  2. […] the impossibility of representing such noises [‘mumble’, ‘sigh’, and ‘groan’] on a comm link or in electronic mail […]

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.

Frequently Asked Questions

How do you spell "electronic mail"?
"electronic mail" is spelled E-L-E-C-T-R-O-N-I-C- -M-A-I-L.
What does "electronic mail" mean?
As a noun, "electronic mail" means: Email (the system).
What language does "electronic mail" come from?
"electronic mail" is a English word. PlainSpell's reference spans five languages -- English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and German -- with definitions, pronunciations, and spelling data for each.
Is PlainSpell free to use?
Yes, PlainSpell is a completely free word reference. You can look up definitions, pronunciations, confusable pairs, homophones, and spelling corrections across 5 languages without any sign-up or subscription.

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list