game
Definition, pronunciation, etymology, and usage for the English word. Free spelling reference powered by Wiktionary.
Letters
4 characters
Language
English
word origin
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Detailed reference entry for the English word "game", 4-letters, with pronunciation in International Phonetic Alphabet notation, etymology traced through Germanic and Romance roots where applicable, common misspelling variants catalogued from Hunspell error dictionaries, and usage frequency ranked against the top 100,000 English words in the Wordfreq corpus. PlainSpell covers English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and German spelling with confusable-pair detection that highlights visually and phonetically similar words. This entry for "game" includes synonyms, antonyms, homophones, and cross-language translation pointers sourced from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org extract. Whether you are verifying the correct spelling of "game" for academic writing, checking homophone confusion, or exploring etymological origins, this page provides a citation-backed, free reference that requires no sign-up.
game is aEnglishnoun. It means: A playful or competitive activity. Pronounced /ɡeɪm/. It ranks #182 in English word frequency. Often confused with GM and ge.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | game |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /ɡeɪm/ |
| Letters | 4 |
| Frequency rank | #182 |
| Misspellings tracked | 5 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Frequency rank visualization
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for game is 4 letters long, classified as anoun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /ɡeɪm/. Corpus data places it at rank #182 in overall English word frequency, putting it firmly in the everyday core of the language.Wiktionary records 21 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our Hunspell-derived misspelling index lists 5 documented wrong-spelling variants for game, with forms such as "agme", "gaem", and "gamme". Each variant represents a distinct typo pattern that appears often enough in corpora to be worth flagging, typically a doubled-consonant error, a silent-letter drop, or a vowel substitution.It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "GM", "ge", "gas", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English game, gamen, gammen, from Old English gamen (“sport, joy, mirth, pastime, game, amusement, pleasure”), from Proto-West Germanic *gaman, from Proto-Germanic *gamaną (“amusement, pleasure, game", literally "participation, communion, people… Root origin matters for spelling because borrowed morphemes (Greek, Latin, Old French, Old English) carry their source-language orthographic conventions into modern English, which is why historical etymology is often the cleanest predictor of whether a cluster like "-ough", "-eau", or "-tion" will appear. For readers arriving here from a spelling check, the authoritative guidance is: the correct English form is game, spelled G-A-M-E, and any other sequence of those letters, regardless of how natural it feels, is a misspelling in standard orthography.
Definition
- 1A playful or competitive activity.
- 2A playful or competitive activity.
- 3A playful or competitive activity.
- 4A playful or competitive activity.
- 5A playful or competitive activity.
- 6A playful or competitive activity.
- 7A playful or competitive activity.
- 8A playful or competitive activity.
- 9A playful or competitive activity.
- 10A playful or competitive activity.
- 11A field of gainful activity, as an industry or profession.
- 12A field of gainful activity, as an industry or profession.
- 13Something that resembles a game with rules, despite not being designed.
- 14An exercise simulating warfare, whether computerized or involving human participants.
- 15A questionable or unethical practice in pursuit of a goal.
- 16Wild animals hunted for food.
- 17The ability to seduce or woo someone, usually by strategy.
- 18Lovemaking, flirtation.
- 19Prostitution. (Now chiefly in on the game.)
- 20Mastery; the ability to excel at something.
- 21Diversion, entertainment.
Etymology
From Middle English game, gamen, gammen, from Old English gamen (“sport, joy, mirth, pastime, game, amusement, pleasure”), from Proto-West Germanic *gaman, from Proto-Germanic *gamaną (“amusement, pleasure, game", literally "participation, communion, people together”), from *ga- (collective prefix) + *mann- (“man”); or alternatively from *ga- + a root from Proto-Indo-European *men- (“to think, have in mind”). Cognate with Yola gaame, gaaume, gaume (“game”), Old Frisian game, gome (“joy, amusement, entertainment”), Dutch gemelijk (“cantankerous, crabbed”), Middle High German gamen (“joy, amusement, fun, pleasure”), Danish gammen (“merriment”), Icelandic, Norwegian Nynorsk gaman (“joy, fun”), Swedish gamman (“mirth, rejoicing, merriment”). Related to gammon, gamble.
Synonyms
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: agme,gaem,gamme,ggame,gmae
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
Relative frequency of common misspelling types for game
Misspelling Variants of "game"
Frequency rank: #182 in English
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Nearby English words
Other entries that begin with the letter G in our English index: