fatuous
/ˈfæt.ju.əs/
"fatuous" is a 7-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“fatuous” is uncommon English (frequency #72,304 among 2,507 “F” headwords), classed as an adjective. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- #72,304
- frequency rank, English
- 2,507
- “F” headwords
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Obnoxiously stupid; vacantly silly; content in one's foolishness.
Corpus desk
Index EN-fatuous · fatuous · English
fatuous · rank #72,304 · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-RARE #72,304
- LEN-LONG 7 letters
- VOW-4 4 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-MID 2,507
- PHOTO-FINISH Felixstowe
Nearest frequency peer: Felixstowe (+2 rank slots)
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.
Long-tail ranks near “fatuous”
Sparse band: bars invert rank so rarer forms read shorter
- Fama
Fama
27,704 corpus weight
- familiarise
familiarise
27,703 corpus weight
- Faraj
Faraj
27,701 corpus weight
- fatuous
fatuous
27,697 corpus weight
- Felixstowe
Felixstowe
27,695 corpus weight
- festschrift
festschrift
27,692 corpus weight
What this shows Long-tail view: where “fatuous” sits against similarly uncommon English ranks.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | fatuous |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Adjective |
| IPA | /ˈfæt.ju.əs/ |
| Letters | 7 |
| Frequency rank | #72,304 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “fatuous” in English
Rare enough to double-check
fatuous is uncommon English at frequency #72,304 among 2,507 “F” headwords, classed as anadjective, transcribed /ˈfæt.ju.əs/. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "Obnoxiously stupid; vacantly silly; content in one's foolishness.".
The misspelling generator found no plausible variants for fatuous, which points to an orthography that plays by predictable English rules. Our confusable-pair dataset has no match for it, since its spelling is unusual enough that it doesn't cluster with a lookalike.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Latin fatuus (“foolish, silly, simple”). The correct English form is fatuous, spelled F-A-T-U-O-U-S.
Definition
- 1Obnoxiously stupid; vacantly silly; content in one's foolishness.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how fatuous appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
A fatuous love affair can easily result in a fatuous marriage. A couple who hardly know each other and, indeed, may not even really like each other, make a commitment that has little chance of being honoured.
While much publicity is given to fatuous 'reversing Beeching' ideas, the reality is that the real investment is focused on expanding the road network - [...].
Etymology
From Latin fatuus (“foolish, silly, simple”).
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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Similar English words by spelling shape
Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "fatuous", not the corpus desk frequency band.
Same letter count
Frequency-ranked English headwords with 7 letters (nearest by frequency rank).