farce
/fɑːs/
"farce" is a 5-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“farce” is a moderately-common English word, ranked #18,821 in English word frequency and used as a noun.
- #18,821
- frequency rank, English
- 5
- letters
- 7
- tracked misspellings
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - A style of humor marked by broad improbabilities with little regard to regularity or method.
Visual similarity to commonly confused words
How many letter changes separate each confused pair (Levenshtein distance, normalized).
Source: PlainSpell confusable corpus (Wiktionary, CC BY-SA).
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | farce |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /fɑːs/ |
| Letters | 5 |
| Frequency rank | #18,821 |
| Misspellings tracked | 7 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “farce” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for farce is 5 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /fɑːs/. Corpus data places it at rank #18,821 in overall English word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it. Wiktionary records 6 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our generated misspelling index lists 7 likely wrong-spelling variants for farce, with forms such as "afrce", "facre", and "farcce". Every one of these variants traces to a single-character edit -- an added or dropped letter, a swapped consonant, or a vowel swap -- the kind of slip a spell-checker is built to catch. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "free", "fire", "farm", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Etymologically, the entry records: Borrowed from Middle French farce (“farce (style of humor); stuffing”) (in the latter sense, via Middle English fars, farsse), from Old French farse, from Medieval Latin farsa, from the feminine perfect passive participle of Latin farciō (“to stuff”). The t… The correct English form is farce, spelled F-A-R-C-E.
Definition
- 1A style of humor marked by broad improbabilities with little regard to regularity or method.
- 2A motion picture or play featuring this style of humor.
- 3A situation abounding with ludicrous incidents.
- 4A ridiculous or empty show.
- 5An elaborate lie.
- 6Forcemeat, stuffing.
Etymology
Borrowed from Middle French farce (“farce (style of humor); stuffing”) (in the latter sense, via Middle English fars, farsse), from Old French farse, from Medieval Latin farsa, from the feminine perfect passive participle of Latin farciō (“to stuff”). The theatre sense alludes to the pleasant and varied character of certain stuffed food items. Doublet of farse.
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: afrce,facre,farcce,farec,farrce,ffarce,frace
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of farce - expressed in single-character edits (insert, delete, or swap one letter). Bigger bars stand out at a glance; a one-edit slip is the hardest to catch.
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 “farce”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is F-A-R-C-E - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /fɑːs/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “free” - see the side-by-side comparison. farce vs free
- 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.