flesh
/flɛʃ/
"flesh" is a 5-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“flesh” is a regularly-used English word, ranked #5,128 in English word frequency and used as a noun.
- #5,128
- frequency rank, English
- 5
- letters
- 8
- tracked misspellings
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - The soft tissue of the body, especially muscle and fat.
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 | flesh |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /flɛʃ/ |
| Letters | 5 |
| Frequency rank | #5,128 |
| Misspellings tracked | 8 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “flesh” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for flesh is 5 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /flɛʃ/. Corpus data places it at rank #5,128 in overall English word frequency, indicating it appears regularly in written and spoken text. Wiktionary records 11 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our generated misspelling index lists 8 likely wrong-spelling variants for flesh, with forms such as "felsh", "fflesh", and "flehs". Each variant is a distinct typo pattern an edit-distance generator flags, typically a doubled-consonant error, a silent-letter drop, or a vowel substitution. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "flew", "flex", "foes", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English flesh, flesch, flæsch, from Old English flǣsċ, from Proto-West Germanic *flaiski, from Proto-Germanic *flaiski, from Proto-Indo-European *pleh₁ḱ- (“to tear, peel off”). Cognates Cognate with Yola vleash, vlesh (“flesh”), North Frisian fl… The correct English form is flesh, spelled F-L-E-S-H.
Definition
- 1The soft tissue of the body, especially muscle and fat.
- 2The skin of a human or animal.
- 3Bare arms, bare legs, bare torso.
- 4Animal tissue regarded as food; meat (but sometimes excluding fish).
- 5The human body as a physical entity.
- 6The mortal body of a human being, contrasted with the spirit or soul.
- 7The evil and corrupting principle working in man.
- 8The soft, often edible, parts of fruits or vegetables.
- 9Tenderness of feeling; gentleness.
- 10Kindred; stock; race.
- 11A yellowish pink color; the color of some Caucasian human skin.
Etymology
From Middle English flesh, flesch, flæsch, from Old English flǣsċ, from Proto-West Germanic *flaiski, from Proto-Germanic *flaiski, from Proto-Indo-European *pleh₁ḱ- (“to tear, peel off”). Cognates Cognate with Yola vleash, vlesh (“flesh”), North Frisian flaasch, flaosk, Fleesk, fleäsk, floask, flääsk, flååsch (“flesh, meat”), Saterland Frisian Flaask (“flesh, meat”), West Frisian fleis (“flesh, meat”), Cimbrian blòas, vlaisch, vlòas (“flesh, meat”), Dutch vlees, vleesch (“flesh, meat”), German Fleisch (“flesh, meat”), German Low German and Luxembourgish Fleesch (“flesh, meat”), Vilamovian fłaś (“meat; muscle”), Yiddish פֿלייש (fleysh, “flesh, meat”), Danish flæsk (“pork; bacon”), Faroese, Icelandic, and Norwegian Nynorsk flesk (“pork; bacon”), Swedish fläsk (“pork”).
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: felsh,fflesh,flehs,fleshh,flessh,fllesh,flseh,lfesh
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of flesh - 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 “flesh”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is F-L-E-S-H - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /flɛʃ/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “flew” - see the side-by-side comparison. flesh vs flew
- 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.