flee
/ˈfliː/verb
flee is spelled F-L-E-E: 4 letters and one syllable. It appears 6.5 times per million words in written English, the 9,463rd most frequent word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). People search “flea vs flee” about 90 times a month (Google, United States). As a verb, flee means “To run away; to escape” (English Wiktionary, September 2026).
How many letters and syllables are in flee?
| Letters | 4: F-L-E-E |
|---|---|
| Syllables | 1 |
| In writing | 6.5 times per million words; the 9,463rd most frequent word form |
| Wrong spellings searched | none measured in search |
| Pairs people search | |
| Sounds like | |
| Same letters |
Sources: letters and syllables from the English Wiktionary's hyphenation or pronunciation; written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media); Bing searches in the United States: the average month from September 2025 to August 2026 (Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, read September 30, 2026); rhymes and same-letter words are computed by PlainSpell from its own word list.
How common is flee?
Flee appears 6.5 times per million words in written English, the 9,463rd 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 flee?
- /ˈfliː/
- [ˈflɪi̯]
Flee has one syllable.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: En-us-flee.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Words people confuse with flee
Word pairs people search, with the monthly searches for “a vs b” (G: Google, B: Bing, United States).
Sounds like: flea (Wiktionary's homophone list; some hold only in some accents).
Sources: Google and Bing searches (September 2025 to August 2026, through DataForSEO); English Wiktionary (homophones, alternative spellings).
What rhymes with flee?
No other word on PlainSpell ends in the same sounds as flee.
Spelled with the same letters in another order: feel, fele.
Computed by PlainSpell from the pronunciations in the English Wiktionary (dump of September 2, 2026): a rhyme shares every sound from the last stressed vowel to the end; ordered by written frequency (wordfreq 3.1).
Forms of flee
- flees present, singular, he/she/it
- fleeing participle, present
- fled participle, past
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
What does flee mean?
The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).
verb
- 1
To run away; to escape.
The prisoner tried to flee, but was caught by the guards.
- 2
To escape from.
Many people fled the country as war loomed.
- 3
To disappear quickly; to vanish; to fleet.
Ethereal products flee once freely exposed to air.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Flee in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
| Language | Words |
|---|---|
| French | s'enfuir, prendre la fuite , fuir, échapper |
| German | fliehen, flüchten , entfliehen |
| Portuguese | escapar, fugir , escapar de, fugir de , sumir |
| Spanish | huir, huirse, fugarse, fuir, fugir, furtarse |
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 flee come from?
From Middle English flen, from Old English flēon, from Proto-West Germanic *fleuhan, from Proto-Germanic *fleuhaną, from Proto-Indo-European *plewk-, *plew- (“to fly, flow, run”).
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).