frightened
frigh·tened/ˈfɹaɪtn̩d/adjective, verb
frightened is spelled F-R-I-G-H-T-E-N-E-D: 10 letters and 2 syllables (frigh·tened). It appears 5.5 times per million words in written English, the 10,519th most frequent word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). As an adjective, frightened means “Afraid; suffering from fear” (English Wiktionary, September 2026).
How many letters and syllables are in frightened?
| Letters | 10: F-R-I-G-H-T-E-N-E-D |
|---|---|
| Syllables | 2: frigh·tened |
| In writing | 5.5 times per million words; the 10,519th most frequent word form |
| Wrong spellings searched | none measured in search |
Sources: letters and syllables from the English Wiktionary's hyphenation or pronunciation; written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
How common is frightened?
Frightened appears 5.5 times per million words in written English, the 10,519th 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 frightened?
- /ˈfɹaɪtn̩d/
- /ˈfɹaɪʔn̩d/
Frightened has 2 syllables, split frigh·tened in writing.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: En-us-frightened.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Forms of frightened
- more frightened comparative
- most frightened superlative
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
What does frightened mean?
The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).
adjective
- 1
Afraid; suffering from fear.
She looked very much frightened of the storm.
verb
- 1
simple past and past participle of frighten
The elephant was frightened by mice.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Frightened in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
In the sense afraid, suffering from fear:
| Language | Words |
|---|---|
| French | effrayé, apeuré |
| German | erschrocken, furchtsam, verängstigt |
| Portuguese | amedrontado, assustado, assombrado |
| Spanish | atemorizado |
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.