four
/foɹ/
"four" is a 4-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“four” is in the everyday core of English, ranked #272 in English word frequency and used as a numeral.
- #272
- frequency rank, English
- 4
- letters
- 5
- tracked misspellings
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - A numerical value equal to 4; the number after three and before five; two plus two. This many dots (••••)
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 | four |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Numeral |
| IPA | /foɹ/ |
| Letters | 4 |
| Frequency rank | #272 |
| Misspellings tracked | 5 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “four” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for four is 4 letters long, classified as a numeral, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /foɹ/. Corpus data places it at rank #272 in overall English word frequency, putting it firmly in the everyday core of the language. Wiktionary records 2 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our generated misspelling index lists 5 likely wrong-spelling variants for four, with forms such as "ffour", "foru", and "fourr". 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 20 confusable-pair relationships, "fu", "fun", "fox", and more, since the words sound or look close enough that writers reach for the wrong one mid-sentence.
Etymologically, the entry records: PIE word *kʷetwóres From Middle English four, from Old English fēower, from Proto-West Germanic *feuwar, from Proto-Germanic *fedwōr, from previous pre-Grimm *petwṓr, from Proto-Indo-European *kʷetwṓr, the neuter form of *kʷetwóres. Doublet of cuatro and q… The correct English form is four, spelled F-O-U-R.
Definition
- 1A numerical value equal to 4; the number after three and before five; two plus two. This many dots (••••)
- 2Describing a set or group with four elements.
Etymology
PIE word *kʷetwóres From Middle English four, from Old English fēower, from Proto-West Germanic *feuwar, from Proto-Germanic *fedwōr, from previous pre-Grimm *petwṓr, from Proto-Indo-European *kʷetwṓr, the neuter form of *kʷetwóres. Doublet of cuatro and quatre. Cognates include Scots fower, Saterland Frisian fjauer, West Frisian fjouwer, Dutch vier, German Low German veer, German vier, Norwegian Bokmål and Danish fire, Swedish fyra, Gothic 𐍆𐌹𐌳𐍅𐍉𐍂 (fidwōr) and, more distantly, Latin quattuor (whence Spanish cuatro, French quatre), Ancient Greek τέσσαρες (téssares), Irish ceathair, Welsh pedwar, Armenian չորս (čʻors), Lithuanian keturi, Albanian katër, Sanskrit चतुर् (catur).
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: ffour,foru,fourr,fuor,ofur
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of four - counted as single-character edits (an insertion, a deletion, or a substituted letter). The larger the bar, the easier the typo is to spot; one-edit slips are the ones that sneak past readers.
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 “four”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is F-O-U-R - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /foɹ/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “fu” - see the side-by-side comparison. four vs fu
- 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.