greeting
/ˈɡɹiːtɪŋ/noun, verb
greeting is spelled G-R-E-E-T-I-N-G: 8 letters and 2 syllables. It appears 4.8 times per million words in written English, the 11,541st most frequent word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). As a noun, greeting means “A conventional phrase used to start a letter or conversation or otherwise to acknowledge a person's arrival or presence” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). The plural of greeting is greetings.
How many letters and syllables are in greeting?
| Letters | 8: G-R-E-E-T-I-N-G |
|---|---|
| Syllables | 2 (from its American pronunciation) |
| In writing | 4.8 times per million words; the 11,541st most frequent word form |
| Wrong spellings searched | none measured in search |
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).
How common is greeting?
Greeting appears 4.8 times per million words in written English, the 11,541st 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 greeting?
- /ˈɡɹiːtɪŋ/
Greeting has 2 syllables (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: LL-Q1860_(eng)-Vealhurl-greeting.wav, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Forms of greeting
- greetings plural
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
What does greeting mean?
The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).
noun
- 1
A conventional phrase used to start a letter or conversation or otherwise to acknowledge a person's arrival or presence.
It's polite to begin a letter with a greeting, but this practice is less common in email.
- 2
The action of the verb to greet.
verb
- 1
present participle and gerund of greet
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Greeting in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
In the sense acknowledgement of a persons presence or arrival:
| Language | Words |
|---|---|
| French | salutation, salut |
| German | Gruß, Begrüßung |
| Portuguese | saudação |
| Spanish | saludo, salutación, saludación |
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 greeting come from?
By surface analysis, greet + -ing.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).