gauge
/ˈɡeɪd͡ʒ/noun, verb
gauge is spelled G-A-U-G-E. The wrong spelling people search most is guage: about 1,860 Bing searches a month in the United States (September 2025 to August 2026), about 2 in 10 of all searches for the word. Gauge is a noun meaning “A measure; a standard of measure; an instrument to determine dimensions, distance, or capacity; a standard”. The plural of gauge is gauges.
How many letters and syllables are in gauge?
| Letters | 5: G-A-U-G-E |
|---|---|
| Syllables | 1 (from its American pronunciation) |
| In writing | 10 times per million words; the 6,884th most frequent word form |
| Wrong spellings searched | 1; the most searched, guage, about 1,860 Bing searches a month (all of them) |
| Pairs people search | |
| Sounds like |
Sources: letters and syllables from the English Wiktionary's hyphenation or pronunciation and the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary; 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 gauge?
Gauge is spelled G-A-U-G-E. One wrong spelling is searched or written often enough to measure; together they are about 2 in 10 of the searches for gauge 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 gauge?
Gauge appears 10 times per million words in written English, the 6,884th most frequent word form in the list. The list counts every capitalisation together, so this includes Gauge, the name.
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
How do you pronounce gauge?
- US /ˈɡeɪd͡ʒ/
- Australia /ˈɡæɪd͡ʒ/
Gauge has one syllable (counted from its American pronunciation in the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary).
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: En-us-gauge.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Words people confuse with gauge
Word pairs people search, with the monthly searches for “a vs b” (G: Google, B: Bing, United States).
Sounds like: gage (Wiktionary's homophone list; some hold only in some accents).
Also written: gage.
Sources: Google and Bing searches (September 2025 to August 2026, through DataForSEO); English Wiktionary (homophones, alternative spellings).
Forms of gauge
- gauges plural, present, singular, he/she/it
- gage US
- gauging participle, present
- gauged participle, past
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
What does gauge mean?
The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).
noun
- 1
A measure; a standard of measure; an instrument to determine dimensions, distance, or capacity; a standard
- 2
An act of measuring.
- 3
An estimate.
- 4
Any instrument for ascertaining or regulating the level, state, dimensions or forms of things
- 5
A thickness of sheet metal or wire designated by any of several numbering schemes, with lower numbers indicating larger size.
- 6
Ellipsis of track gauge.
- 7
Ellipsis of loading gauge.
- 8
A semi-norm; a function that assigns a non-negative size to all vectors in a vector space.
verb
- 1
To measure or determine with a gauge; to measure the capacity of.
- 2
To estimate.
- 3
To appraise the character or ability of; to judge of.
- 4
To draw into equidistant gathers by running a thread through it.
- 5
To mix (a quantity of ordinary plaster) with a quantity of plaster of Paris.
- 6
To chip, hew or polish (stones, bricks, etc) to a standard size and/or shape.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Gauge in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
| Language | Words |
|---|---|
| French | gabarit , étalon , mesurer , estimer, jauger |
| German | Meter, Messgerät, Maß , Messlehre , messen, genau messen |
| Portuguese | medida, medição , medidor , medir , calibre |
| Spanish | medida, patrón , medidor, galga, indicador , medir |
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 gauge come from?
From Middle English gauge, gaugen, from Anglo-Norman, Old Northern French gauger (compare Modern French jauger from Old French jaugier), from gauge (“gauging rod”), from Frankish *galgā (“measuring rod, pole”), from Proto-Germanic *galgô (“pole, stake, cross”), from Proto-Indo-European *ǵʰalgʰ-, *ǵʰalg- (“perch, long switch”). Cognate with Old High German galgo, Old Frisian galga, Old English ġealga (“cross-beam, gallows”), Old Norse galgi (“cross-beam, gallows”), Old Norse gelgja (“pole, perch”). Doublet of gallows.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).