fey
/feɪ/
"fey" is a 3-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“fey” is a moderately-common English word, ranked #29,654 in English word frequency and used as an adjective.
- #29,654
- frequency rank, English
- 3
- letters
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - About to die; doomed; on the verge of sudden or violent death.
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 | fey |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Adjective |
| IPA | /feɪ/ |
| Letters | 3 |
| Frequency rank | #29,654 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “fey” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for fey is 3 letters long, classified as an adjective, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /feɪ/. Corpus data places it at rank #29,654 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.
Zero misspellings are on record for fey in our index, which points to an orthography that plays by predictable English rules. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "fi", "FL", "FM", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English feye (“fated to die”), from Old English fǣġe (“doomed to die, timid”), from Proto-West Germanic *faigī, from Proto-Germanic *faigijaz (“cowardly, wicked”), from Proto-Indo-European *peyk- (“ill-meaning, bad”). Akin to Old Saxon fēgi, whe… The correct English form is fey, spelled F-E-Y.
Definition
- 1About to die; doomed; on the verge of sudden or violent death.
- 2Dying; dead.
- 3Possessing second sight, clairvoyance, or clairaudience.
- 4Overrefined, affected.
- 5Strange or otherworldly.
- 6Spellbound.
Etymology
From Middle English feye (“fated to die”), from Old English fǣġe (“doomed to die, timid”), from Proto-West Germanic *faigī, from Proto-Germanic *faigijaz (“cowardly, wicked”), from Proto-Indo-European *peyk- (“ill-meaning, bad”). Akin to Old Saxon fēgi, whence Dutch veeg (“doomed, near death”), Old High German feigi (“appointed for death, ungodly”) whence German feige (“cowardly”), Old Norse feigr (“doomed”) whence the Icelandic feigur (“doomed to die”), Old English fāh (“outlawed, hostile”). More at foe.
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 “fey”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is F-E-Y - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /feɪ/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “fi” - see the side-by-side comparison. fey vs fi
- 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.