forerunner
/ˈfɔɹˌɹʌnɚ/noun
forerunner is spelled F-O-R-E-R-U-N-N-E-R. The wrong spelling people search most is forunner: about 30 Bing searches a month in the United States (September 2025 to August 2026), about 1 in 81 of all searches for the word. Forerunner is a noun meaning “A runner at the front or ahead”. The plural of forerunner is forerunners.
How many letters and syllables are in forerunner?
| Letters | 10: F-O-R-E-R-U-N-N-E-R |
|---|---|
| Syllables | 3 (from its American pronunciation) |
| In writing | about once in every 1 million words; the 29,270th most frequent word form |
| Wrong spellings searched | 1; the most searched, forunner, about 30 Bing searches a month (all of them) |
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).
How do you spell forerunner?
Forerunner is spelled F-O-R-E-R-U-N-N-E-R. One wrong spelling is searched or written often enough to measure; together they are about 1 in 81 of the searches for forerunner in either form.
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). Wrong spellings are taken from Wiktionary entries tagged "misspelling" and its obsolete or nonstandard forms, Wikipedia's Lists of common misspellings and the codespell dictionary, then measured. The proofreader's marks show the change that corrects each one.
How common is forerunner?
Forerunner appears about once in every 1 million words in written English, the 29,270th 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 forerunner?
- US /ˈfɔɹˌɹʌnɚ/
Forerunner has 3 syllables (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: LL-Q1860_(eng)-Vininn126-forerunner.wav, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Forms of forerunner
- forerunners plural
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
What does forerunner mean?
The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).
noun
- 1
A runner at the front or ahead.
- 2
By extension, a non-competitor who leads out the competitors on to the circuit, or who runs/rides the course prior to competitor trials, usually testing or checking the way.
- 3
A precursor or harbinger, a warning ahead.
- 4
A forebear, an ancestor, a predecessor.
Bakelite is a forerunner of today's plastics.
- 5
A postage stamp used in the time before a region or area issues stamps of its own.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Forerunner in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
| Language | Words |
|---|---|
| German | Vornewegläufer, Frontläufer , Vorbote, Vorzeichen, Vorläufer, Wegbereiter |
| French | prédécesseur, avant coureur |
| Portuguese | precursor |
| Spanish | precursor |
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 forerunner come from?
From Middle English forrenner, foreriner. Calque of Latin praecursor (“one who runs before, a forerunner”). Equivalent to fore- + runner and/or forerun + -er.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).