enby
/ˈɛnbi/
"enby" is a 4-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“enby” is uncommon English (outside the top frequency list), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency English
- 4
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Pronunciation spelling of NB (“a non-binary person; a person whose gender identity is not strictly female or male; one who is outside of the gender binary”).
Corpus desk
Index EN-enby · enby · English
enby · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
- LEN-MID 4 letters
- VOW-2 2 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.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | enby |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /ˈɛnbi/ |
| Letters | 4 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “enby” in English
Rare enough to double-check
enby is uncommon English outside the top frequency list, classed as anoun, transcribed /ˈɛnbi/. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "Pronunciation spelling of NB (“a non-binary person; a person whose gender identity is not strictly female or male; one who is outside of the gender binary”).".
No misspelling variants are generated for enby in our index, typically a sign the spelling maps closely to how the word sounds. This entry stands alone in our confusable dataset, since nothing in our dataset looks or sounds close enough to cause mix-ups.
Etymologically, the entry records: The noun is a pronunciation spelling of NB, an initialism of non-binary. The word was coined by the Tumblr user “revolutionator” in 2013 as “an nb equivalent to words like boys and girls”: see the quotation. The adjective is derived from the noun. The correct English form is enby, spelled E-N-B-Y.
Definition
- 1Pronunciation spelling of NB (“a non-binary person; a person whose gender identity is not strictly female or male; one who is outside of the gender binary”).
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how enby appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
i wish there was an nb equivalent to words like boys and girls / nb / enby / enbies
I doubt most wedding fair vendors would recognise an enby even if you carried an explanatory sign.
Etymology
The noun is a pronunciation spelling of NB, an initialism of non-binary. The word was coined by the Tumblr user “revolutionator” in 2013 as “an nb equivalent to words like boys and girls”: see the quotation. The adjective is derived from the noun.
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.