flu
/fluː/noun
flu is spelled F-L-U: 3 letters and one syllable. It appears 9.1 times per million words in written English, the 7,553rd most frequent word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). People search “flu vs flue” about 720 times a month (Google, United States). As a noun, flu means “Influenza” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). The plural of flu is flus.
How many letters and syllables are in flu?
| Letters | 3: F-L-U |
|---|---|
| Syllables | 1 (from its American pronunciation) |
| In writing | 9.1 times per million words; the 7,553rd most frequent word form |
| Wrong spellings searched | none measured in search |
| Pairs people search | |
| Sounds like | |
| Rhymes with |
Sources: letters and syllables from the English Wiktionary's hyphenation or pronunciation and the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary; 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 flu?
Flu appears 9.1 times per million words in written English, the 7,553rd 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 flu?
- UK /fluː/
- Australia /flʉː/
Flu has one syllable (counted from its American pronunciation in the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary).
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: En-us-flu.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Words people confuse with flu
Word pairs people search, with the monthly searches for “a vs b” (G: Google, B: Bing, United States).
Sounds like: flew, flue (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 flu?
The 12 most written words on PlainSpell end in the same sounds as flu from its last stressed vowel (/u/, British pronunciation):
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 flu
- flus plural
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
What does flu mean?
The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).
noun
- 1
Influenza.
catch flu
- 2
informalStomach flu.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Flu in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
In the sense influenza:
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 flu come from?
Clipping of influenza.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).