facetious
/fəˈsiːʃəs/
"facetious" is a 9-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“facetious” is an uncommon English word, ranked #52,307 in English word frequency and used as an adjective.
- #52,307
- frequency rank, English
- 9
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - Treating serious issues with (often deliberately) inappropriate humour; flippant.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | facetious |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Adjective |
| IPA | /fəˈsiːʃəs/ |
| Letters | 9 |
| Frequency rank | #52,307 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “facetious” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for facetious is 9 letters long, classified as an adjective, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /fəˈsiːʃəs/. Corpus data places it at rank #52,307 in overall English word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it. Wiktionary records 3 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
We couldn't generate a plausible misspelling set for facetious, a sign its spelling follows regular English conventions. Our dataset records no confusable match here, which typically means the spelling is too distinctive to be mistaken for another word.
Etymologically, the entry records: From French facétieux, from Latin facētia (“jest, wit, humor”), from facētus (“witty, jocose, facetious”). The correct English form is facetious, spelled F-A-C-E-T-I-O-U-S.
Definition
- 1Treating serious issues with (often deliberately) inappropriate humour; flippant.
- 2Pleasantly humorous; jocular.
- 3humorously silly or counterproductive for the purpose of sarcastically advocating the opposite.
Etymology
From French facétieux, from Latin facētia (“jest, wit, humor”), from facētus (“witty, jocose, facetious”).
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); 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 “facetious”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is F-A-C-E-T-I-O-U-S - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /fəˈsiːʃəs/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- 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.