flirt
Definition, pronunciation, etymology, and usage for the English word. Free spelling reference powered by Wiktionary.
Letters
5 characters
Language
English
word origin
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Detailed reference entry for the English word "flirt", 5-letters, with pronunciation in International Phonetic Alphabet notation, etymology traced through Germanic and Romance roots where applicable, common misspelling variants catalogued from Hunspell error dictionaries, and usage frequency ranked against the top 100,000 English words in the Wordfreq corpus. PlainSpell covers English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and German spelling with confusable-pair detection that highlights visually and phonetically similar words. This entry for "flirt" includes synonyms, antonyms, homophones, and cross-language translation pointers sourced from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org extract. Whether you are verifying the correct spelling of "flirt" for academic writing, checking homophone confusion, or exploring etymological origins, this page provides a citation-backed, free reference that requires no sign-up.
flirt is aEnglishnoun. It means: A sudden jerk; a quick throw or cast; a darting motion Pronounced /flɜːt/. Often confused with fort and flor.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | flirt |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /flɜːt/ |
| Letters | 5 |
| Frequency rank | #14,539 |
| Misspellings tracked | 8 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Frequency rank visualization
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for flirt is 5 letters long, classified as anoun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /flɜːt/. Corpus data places it at rank #14,539 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.
Our Hunspell-derived misspelling index lists 8 documented wrong-spelling variants for flirt, with forms such as "fflirt", "filrt", and "flirrt". Each variant represents a distinct typo pattern that appears often enough in corpora to be worth flagging, typically a doubled-consonant error, a silent-letter drop, or a vowel substitution.It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "fort", "flor", "float", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Etymologically, the entry records: 1553, from the merger of Early Modern English flirt (“to flick”), flurt (“to mock, jibe, scorn”), and flirt, flurt (“a giddy girl”). Of obscure origin and relation. Apparently related to similar words in Germanic, all of apparently onomatopoeic origin, comp… Root origin matters for spelling because borrowed morphemes (Greek, Latin, Old French, Old English) carry their source-language orthographic conventions into modern English, which is why historical etymology is often the cleanest predictor of whether a cluster like "-ough", "-eau", or "-tion" will appear. For readers arriving here from a spelling check, the authoritative guidance is: the correct English form is flirt, spelled F-L-I-R-T, and any other sequence of those letters, regardless of how natural it feels, is a misspelling in standard orthography.
Definition
- 1A sudden jerk; a quick throw or cast; a darting motion
- 2Someone who flirts a lot or enjoys flirting; a flirtatious person.
- 3An act of flirting.
- 4A tentative or brief, passing engagement with something.
- 5A brief shower (of rain or snow).
- 6Russula vesca, an edible woodland mushroom.
Etymology
1553, from the merger of Early Modern English flirt (“to flick”), flurt (“to mock, jibe, scorn”), and flirt, flurt (“a giddy girl”). Of obscure origin and relation. Apparently related to similar words in Germanic, all of apparently onomatopoeic origin, compare Low German flirt (“a flick of the fingers, a light blow”), Low German flirtje (“a giddy girl”), Low German flirtje (“a flirt”), German Flittchen (“a flirt; tart; hussy”), Norwegian flira (“to giggle, titter”). Compare also Early Modern English jillflirt, gillian flirt, and flirt-gill (“a flirt”), and Scots flird (“a trifling", also, "to jibe, jeer at, talk idly, flirt, flaunt”), which is perhaps from Middle English flerd (“mockery, fraud, deception”), from Old English fleard (“nonsense, vanity, folly, deception”); potentially related to Icelandic flærð (“trickiness, deceit”), Swedish flärd (“vanity, frivolity, flamboyance”), Dutch flard (“tatter, shred”). See flird.
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: fflirt,filrt,flirrt,flirtt,flitr,fllirt,flrit,lfirt
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
Relative frequency of common misspelling types for flirt
Misspelling Variants of "flirt"
Frequency rank: #14,539 in English
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Nearby English words
Other entries that begin with the letter F in our English index: