fuck
/fʌk/
"fuck" is a 4-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“fuck” is in the everyday core of English, ranked #396 in English word frequency and used as a verb.
- #396
- frequency rank, English
- 4
- letters
- 6
- tracked misspellings
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - To have sexual intercourse; to copulate.
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 | fuck |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Verb |
| IPA | /fʌk/ |
| Letters | 4 |
| Frequency rank | #396 |
| Misspellings tracked | 6 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “fuck” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for fuck is 4 letters long, classified as a verb, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /fʌk/. Corpus data places it at rank #396 in overall English word frequency, putting it firmly in the everyday core of the language. Wiktionary records 13 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our generated misspelling index lists 6 likely wrong-spelling variants for fuck, with forms such as "fcuk", "ffuck", and "fucck". Each of these forms differs from the correct spelling by one small edit: a doubled letter, a dropped silent letter, or a substituted vowel. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "fun", "fur", "fut", and more, since the words sound or look close enough that writers reach for the wrong one mid-sentence.
Etymologically, the entry records: Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *pewǵ- Proto-Germanic *fukkōną Old English *fuccian Middle English *fukken English fuck From Middle English *fukken, probably of Germanic origin: either from Old English *fuccian or Old Norse *fukka, both from Proto-German… The correct English form is fuck, spelled F-U-C-K.
Definition
- 1To have sexual intercourse; to copulate.
- 2To have sexual intercourse; to copulate.
- 3To have sexual intercourse; to copulate.
- 4To have sexual intercourse; to copulate.
- 5To have sexual intercourse; to copulate.
- 6To put in an extremely difficult or impossible situation.
- 7To defraud, deface, or otherwise treat badly.
- 8Used to express great displeasure with, or contemptuous dismissal of, someone or something.
- 9To break, to destroy.
- 10Used in a phrasal verb: fuck with (“to play with, to tinker”).
- 11To throw, to lob something. (angrily)
- 12To scold.
- 13To be very good, to rule, go hard.
Etymology
Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *pewǵ- Proto-Germanic *fukkōną Old English *fuccian Middle English *fukken English fuck From Middle English *fukken, probably of Germanic origin: either from Old English *fuccian or Old Norse *fukka, both from Proto-Germanic *fukkōną, from Proto-Indo-European *pewǵ- (“to strike, punch, stab”). Compare windfucker and its debated etymology. Possibly attested in a 772 CE charter that mentions a place called Fuccerham, which may mean "hām (“home”) of the fucker" or "hamm (“pasture”) of the fucker"; a John le Fucker in a record from 1278 may just be a variant of Fulcher; compare Fucher, Foker, etc. The earliest unambiguous use of the word in a clearly sexual context, in any stage of English, appears to be in court documents from Cheshire, England, which mention a man called Roger Fuckebythenavele (possibly tongue-in-cheek or directly suggestive of a depraved sexual act) on 8 December 1310. It was first listed in a dictionary in 1598. Scots fuk or fuck is attested slightly earlier, probably reinforcing the Northern Germanic/Scandinavian origin theory. From 1500 onward, the word has been in continual use, superseding jape and sard and largely displacing swive. See windfucker and fuckwind for more information. * A range of folk-etymological backronyms, such as fornication under consent of the king and for unlawful carnal knowledge, are all demonstrably false. * Verb sense 7 from related sense feck.
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: fcuk,ffuck,fucck,fuckk,fukc,ufck
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of fuck - measured in single-character edits (insert, delete, or substitute a letter). Larger bars are easier to catch; one-edit slips are the sneakiest.
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 “fuck”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is F-U-C-K - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /fʌk/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “fun” - see the side-by-side comparison. fuck vs fun
- 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.