Skip to main content
PlainSpell

fake

/feɪ̯k/adjective, noun, verb

fake is spelled F-A-K-E: 4 letters and one syllable. It appears 45 times per million words in written English, the 2,253rd most frequent word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). As an adjective, fake means “Not real; false, fraudulent” (English Wiktionary, September 2026).

How many letters and syllables are in fake?

Letters4: F-A-K-E
Syllables1 (from its American pronunciation)
In writing45 times per million words; the 2,253rd most frequent word form
Wrong spellings searchednone measured in search

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).

How common is fake?

Fake appears 45 times per million words in written English, the 2,253rd 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 fake?

  • /feɪ̯k/

Fake has one syllable (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-fake.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).

Words people confuse with fake

Also written: flake.

Sources: English Wiktionary (homophones, alternative spellings).

Forms of fake

  • faker comparative
  • more fake comparative
  • fakest superlative
  • most fake superlative
  • fakes plural, present, singular, he/she/it
  • faking participle, present
  • faked participle, past

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

What does fake mean?

The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).

adjective

  1. 1

    Not real; false, fraudulent.

    Which fur coat looks fake?

  2. 2

    Insincere

noun

  1. 1

    Something which is not genuine, or is presented fraudulently.

    I suspect this passport is a fake.

  2. 2

    A move meant to deceive an opposing player, used for gaining advantage for example when dribbling an opponent.

  3. 3

    archaicA trick; a swindle.

  4. 4

    An impostor.

  5. 5

    One of the circles or windings of a cable or hawser, as it lies in a coil; a single turn or coil.

verb

  1. 1

    To make a counterfeit, to counterfeit, to forge, to falsify.

  2. 2

    To make a false display of, to affect, to feign, to simulate.

    to fake a marriage

  3. 3

    archaicTo cheat; to swindle; to steal; to rob.

  4. 4

    archaicTo modify fraudulently, so as to make an object appear better or other than it really is.

  5. 5

    To improvise, in jazz.

    In the face of this print music culture, 'faking' was the ability–at once respected and disrespected–to improvise a song (or a part in an arrangement) without reading the notation.

  6. 6

    To coil (a rope, line, or hawser), by winding alternately in opposite directions, in layers usually of zigzag or figure of eight form, to prevent twisting when running out.

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

Fake in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese

LanguageWords
Frenchfaux, factice, artificiel, contrefait, falsifié, feint (not real)
Germangefälscht, unecht (not real), Fälschung, Illusion, Imitat, Schwindel (something which is not genuine, or is presented…)
Portuguesefalso, de mentira (not real), falsificação (something which is not genuine, or is presented…), falsificar (modify fraudulently to make sth. look better), falsear (counterfeit, falsify)
Spanishfalso, sacha (not real), falsificación, doblete (something which is not genuine, or is presented…), kalé, impostado (insincere)

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 fake come from?

The origin is not known with certainty, although first attested in 1775 C.E. in British criminals' slang. It is probably from feak, feague (“to give a better appearance through artificial means, spruce up, embellish”), itself from German Low German fegen, from Middle Low German vēgen, from Old Saxon fegōn, from Proto-West Germanic *fegōn (“to clean up, polish”). Akin to Dutch veeg (“a swipe”), Dutch vegen (“to sweep, wipe”); German fegen (“to sweep, to polish”). Compare also Old English fācn (“deceit, fraud”).

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

What to look up after fake