embitter
Definition, pronunciation, etymology, and usage for the English word. Free spelling reference powered by Wiktionary.
Letters
8 characters
Language
English
word origin
Source
Wiktionary
open dictionary
Access
Free
no sign-up needed
Detailed reference entry for the English word "embitter", 8-letters, with pronunciation in International Phonetic Alphabet notation, etymology traced through Germanic and Romance roots where applicable, common misspelling variants catalogued from Hunspell error dictionaries, and usage frequency ranked against the top 100,000 English words in the Wordfreq corpus. PlainSpell covers English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and German spelling with confusable-pair detection that highlights visually and phonetically similar words. This entry for "embitter" includes synonyms, antonyms, homophones, and cross-language translation pointers sourced from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org extract. Whether you are verifying the correct spelling of "embitter" for academic writing, checking homophone confusion, or exploring etymological origins, this page provides a citation-backed, free reference that requires no sign-up.
embitter is aEnglishverb. It means: To cause (something) to be or taste bitter; to bitter. Pronounced /ɪmˈbɪtə/.
Compare similar words
See how embitter compares against similar English words.
Browse all word comparisons →| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | embitter |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Verb |
| IPA | /ɪmˈbɪtə/ |
| Letters | 8 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Frequency rank visualization
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for embitter is 8 letters long, classified as averb, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /ɪmˈbɪtə/. It sits outside the most-frequent rank tiers, which is often why uncommon words generate more spelling variants per reader.Wiktionary records 3 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
No frequent misspelling variants are recorded for embitter in our index, suggesting the orthography either follows predictable English patterns or the word is uncommon enough that typo corpora lack signal.It is not paired with a close-neighbour confusable in our dataset, which tends to mean the word is visually distinctive enough to stand on its own.
Etymologically, the entry records: From em- (variant of the suffix en- with the sense ‘to become’) + bitter. Root origin matters for spelling because borrowed morphemes (Greek, Latin, Old French, Old English) carry their source-language orthographic conventions into modern English, which is why historical etymology is often the cleanest predictor of whether a cluster like "-ough", "-eau", or "-tion" will appear. For readers arriving here from a spelling check, the authoritative guidance is: the correct English form is embitter, spelled E-M-B-I-T-T-E-R, and any other sequence of those letters, regardless of how natural it feels, is a misspelling in standard orthography.
Definition
- 1To cause (something) to be or taste bitter; to bitter.
- 2To cause (a positive quality such as happiness, or a thing such as an activity or one's life) to become less good or pleasurable; also, to make (a negative quality, or thing such as a disagreement) worse or more unpleasant.
- 3To cause (someone or their feelings) to become more angry, resentful, or unfriendly; to envenom.
Etymology
From em- (variant of the suffix en- with the sense ‘to become’) + bitter.
This word in other languages
Frequently Asked Questions
How do you spell "embitter"?
What does "embitter" mean?
How do you pronounce "embitter"?
What is the origin of the word "embitter"?
Is PlainSpell free to use?
Nearby English words
Other entries that begin with the letter E in our English index: