feud
/fjuːd/
"feud" is a 4-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“feud” is a moderately-common English word, ranked #12,598 in English word frequency and used as a noun.
- #12,598
- frequency rank, English
- 4
- letters
- 5
- tracked misspellings
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - A state of long-standing mutual hostility.
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 | feud |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /fjuːd/ |
| Letters | 4 |
| Frequency rank | #12,598 |
| Misspellings tracked | 5 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “feud” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for feud is 4 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /fjuːd/. Corpus data places it at rank #12,598 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.
Our generated misspelling index lists 5 likely wrong-spelling variants for feud, with forms such as "efud", "fedu", and "feudd". 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, "fu", "few", "fun", and more, a pairing that trips writers up because the two words share enough sound or shape to blur together.
Etymologically, the entry records: Inherited from Northern Middle English fede, feide, from Old French faide, feide, fede, from Proto-West Germanic *faihiþu (“hatred, enmity”) (corresponding to foe + -th), from Proto-Indo-European *peyḱ- (“hostile”). Cognate to Old English fǣhþ, fǣhþu, fǣhþo… The correct English form is feud, spelled F-E-U-D.
Definition
- 1A state of long-standing mutual hostility.
- 2A staged rivalry between wrestlers.
- 3A combination of kindred to avenge injuries or affronts, done or offered to any of their blood, on the offender and all his race.
Etymology
Inherited from Northern Middle English fede, feide, from Old French faide, feide, fede, from Proto-West Germanic *faihiþu (“hatred, enmity”) (corresponding to foe + -th), from Proto-Indo-European *peyḱ- (“hostile”). Cognate to Old English fǣhþ, fǣhþu, fǣhþo (“hostility, enmity, violence, revenge, vendetta”), German Fehde, and Dutch vete (“feud”) (directly inherited from Proto-West Germanic) alongside Danish fejde (“feud, enmity, hostility, war”) and Swedish fejd (“feud, controversy, quarrel, strife”) (borrowed from Middle Low German).
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: efud,fedu,feudd,ffeud,fued
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of feud - counted as single-character edits (an insertion, a deletion, or a substituted letter). The larger the bar, the easier the typo is to spot; one-edit slips are the ones that sneak past readers.
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 “feud”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is F-E-U-D - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /fjuːd/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “fu” - see the side-by-side comparison. feud vs fu
- 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.