friend
/fɹɛnd/
"friend" is a 6-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“friend” is in the everyday core of English, ranked #420 in English word frequency and used as a noun.
- #420
- frequency rank, English
- 6
- letters
- 9
- tracked misspellings
- 14
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - A person, typically someone other than a family member, spouse or lover, whose company one enjoys and towards whom one feels affection.
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 | friend |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /fɹɛnd/ |
| Letters | 6 |
| Frequency rank | #420 |
| Misspellings tracked | 9 |
| Confusable pairs | 14 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “friend” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for friend is 6 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /fɹɛnd/. Corpus data places it at rank #420 in overall English word frequency, putting it firmly in the everyday core of the language. Wiktionary records 11 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our generated misspelling index lists 9 likely wrong-spelling variants for friend, with forms such as "ffriend", "firend", and "freind". 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 14 confusable-pair relationships, "fries", "frigid", "frieze", and more, since the words sound or look close enough that writers reach for the wrong one mid-sentence.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English frend, freend, from Old English frēond (“friend”, literally “loving [one], lover”), from Proto-West Germanic *friund, from Proto-Germanic *frijōndz (“lover, friend”), from Proto-Indo-European *preyH- (“to love”), roughly equivalent to fr… The correct English form is friend, spelled F-R-I-E-N-D.
Definition
- 1A person, typically someone other than a family member, spouse or lover, whose company one enjoys and towards whom one feels affection.
- 2An associate who provides assistance; patron, mentor.
- 3A person with whom one is vaguely or indirectly acquainted.
- 4A person who backs or supports something.
- 5An object or idea that can be used for good.
- 6Used as a form of address when warning someone.
- 7A function or class granted special access to the private and protected members of another class.
- 8A spring-loaded camming device.
- 9A lover; a boyfriend or girlfriend.
- 10A relative, a relation by blood or marriage.
- 11Used to refer collectively to a group of associated individuals, especially those comprising a cast, company, or crew
Etymology
From Middle English frend, freend, from Old English frēond (“friend”, literally “loving [one], lover”), from Proto-West Germanic *friund, from Proto-Germanic *frijōndz (“lover, friend”), from Proto-Indo-European *preyH- (“to love”), roughly equivalent to free + -nd. See also Friday. Cognates Cognate with Scots freend (“friend”), Yola friend, vriene (“friend”), North Frisian frinj, frün (“friend”), Saterland Frisian Fjund, Früünd (“friend”), West Frisian freon, freondinne (“friend”), Cimbrian bròint, vròint (“friend”), Dutch vriend (“friend”), German Freund (“friend”), German Low German Fründ (“friend, relative”), Luxembourgish Frënd (“friend”), Vilamovian fraeind, frajnd (“friend”), Yiddish פֿרײַנד (fraynd, “friend”), Danish frænde (“kinsman”), Faroese, Icelandic frændi (“kinsman”), Norwegian Bokmål, Norwegian Nynorsk frende (“relative”), Swedish frände (“kinsman, relative”), Gothic 𐍆𐍂𐌹𐌾𐍉𐌽𐌳𐍃 (frijōnds, “friend”). More at free. Akin to Russian прия́тель (prijátelʹ, “friend”), Romanian prieten, and Sanskrit प्रिय (priyá-, “beloved”).
Synonyms
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: ffriend,firend,freind,friedn,friendd,friennd,frined,frriend,rfiend
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of friend - 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
How do you spell "friend"?
What does "friend" mean?
What words are commonly confused with "friend"?
How do you pronounce "friend"?
What is the origin of the word "friend"?
Is PlainSpell free to use?
Using “friend”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is F-R-I-E-N-D - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /fɹɛnd/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “fries” - see the side-by-side comparison. friend vs fries
- 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.