fleeting
/ˈfliːtɪŋ/
"fleeting" is a 8-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“fleeting” is a moderately-common English word, ranked #19,087 in English word frequency and used as an adjective.
- #19,087
- frequency rank, English
- 8
- letters
- 12
- tracked misspellings
- 10
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - Passing quickly; of short duration.
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 | fleeting |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Adjective |
| IPA | /ˈfliːtɪŋ/ |
| Letters | 8 |
| Frequency rank | #19,087 |
| Misspellings tracked | 12 |
| Confusable pairs | 10 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “fleeting” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for fleeting is 8 letters long, classified as an adjective, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /ˈfliːtɪŋ/. Corpus data places it at rank #19,087 in overall English word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it. Wiktionary records 2 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our generated misspelling index lists 12 likely wrong-spelling variants for fleeting, with forms such as "feleting", "ffleeting", and "fleeitng". 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 10 confusable-pair relationships, "Fleming", "freeing", "flexing", and more, a pairing that trips writers up because the two words share enough sound or shape to blur together.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English fleten (“to float”), from Old English flēotan (“to float”), from Proto-Germanic *fleutaną, from Proto-Indo-European *plewd-. By surface analysis, fleet + -ing. The correct English form is fleeting, spelled F-L-E-E-T-I-N-G.
Definition
- 1Passing quickly; of short duration.
- 2That which flees, especially quickly; fugitive.
Etymology
From Middle English fleten (“to float”), from Old English flēotan (“to float”), from Proto-Germanic *fleutaną, from Proto-Indo-European *plewd-. By surface analysis, fleet + -ing.
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: feleting,ffleeting,fleeitng,fleetign,fleetingg,fleetinng,fleetnig,fleetting,fleteing,fleting,flleeting,lfeeting
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of fleeting - 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 “fleeting”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is F-L-E-E-T-I-N-G - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /ˈfliːtɪŋ/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “Fleming” - see the side-by-side comparison. fleeting vs Fleming
- 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.