future
fu·ture/ˈfju.t͡ʃɚ/noun, adjective
future is spelled F-U-T-U-R-E, 2 syllables: fu·ture. The wrong spelling people search most is furture: about 160 Bing searches a month in the United States (September 2025 to August 2026), about 1 in 81 of all searches for the word. Future is a noun meaning “The time ahead; those moments yet to be experienced”. The plural of future is futures.
How many letters and syllables are in future?
| Letters | 6: F-U-T-U-R-E |
|---|---|
| Syllables | 2: fu·ture |
| In writing | 214 times per million words; the 471st most frequent word form |
| Wrong spellings searched | 1; the most searched, furture, about 160 Bing searches a month (all of them) |
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); 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 future?
Future is spelled F-U-T-U-R-E. One wrong spelling is searched or written often enough to measure; together they are about 1 in 80 of the searches for future 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 future?
Future appears 214 times per million words in written English, the 471st 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 future?
- UK /ˈfjuː.t͡ʃəː/
- UK [ˈfjʊu̯.t͡ʃəː]
- US /ˈfju.t͡ʃɚ/
Future has 2 syllables, split fu·ture in writing.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: LL-Q1860_(eng)-Naomi_Persephone_Amethyst_(NaomiAmethyst)-future.wav, En-us-future.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Words people confuse with future
Also written: futures.
Sources: English Wiktionary (homophones, alternative spellings).
Forms of future
- futures plural
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
What does future mean?
The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).
noun
- 1
The time ahead; those moments yet to be experienced.
- 2
Something that will happen in moments yet to come.
- 3
Goodness in what is yet to come. Something to look forward to.
There is no future in dwelling on the past.
- 4
The likely prospects for or fate of someone or something in time to come.
- 5
Verb tense used to talk about events that will happen in the future; future tense.
- 6
Alternative form of futures.
- 7
An object that retrieves the value of a promise.
- 8
A minor-league prospect.
adjective
- 1
Having to do with or occurring in the future.
Future generations will either laugh or cry at our stupidity.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How do you abbreviate future?
Wiktionary records one abbreviation of future: fut..
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Future in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
| Language | Words |
|---|---|
| French | avenir, futur |
| German | Zukunft , Futur , Future , zukünftig, künftig |
| Portuguese | futuro , vindouro |
| Spanish | futuro, porvenir , venidero |
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 future come from?
From Middle English future, futur, from Old French futur, from Latin futūrus, irregular future active participle of sum (“to be”), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰuH- (“to become, be”). Cognate with Old English bēo (“to become, will be; to be”). More at be. Doublet of futur. Displaced native Old English tōweard, which took on a different meaning as toward, and Middle English afterhede (“future”, literally “afterhood”) in the given sense.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).