herring
/ˈhɛɹɪŋ/noun
herring is spelled H-E-R-R-I-N-G: 7 letters and 2 syllables. It appears 3.0 times per million words in written English, the 15,368th most frequent word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). As a noun, herring means “A type of small, oily fish of the genus Clupea, often used as food” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). The plural of herring is herrings.
How many letters and syllables are in herring?
| Letters | 7: H-E-R-R-I-N-G |
|---|---|
| Syllables | 2 (from its American pronunciation) |
| In writing | 3.0 times per million words; the 15,368th 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 herring?
Herring appears 3.0 times per million words in written English, the 15,368th 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 herring?
- /ˈhɛɹɪŋ/
Herring 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: En-us-herring.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Forms of herring
- herrings plural
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
What does herring mean?
The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).
noun
- 1
A type of small, oily fish of the genus Clupea, often used as food.
- 2
Fish in the family Clupeidae.
- 3
Those fish and any other fish similar to those in genus Clupea, many of those in the order Clupeiformes.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Herring in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
In the sense fish in Clupea:
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 herring come from?
From Middle English hering, from Old English hǣring, from Proto-West Germanic *hāring (“herring”), further etymology unknown. Possibly derived from Proto-Germanic *hērą (“hair”) + -ing, due to the similarity of their fine bones to hair. Cognate with Scots hering, haring (“herring”), Saterland Frisian Hiering, Häiring (“herring”), West Frisian hjerring (“herring”), Dutch haring (“herring”), German Low German Hereng, Hering (“herring”), German Hering (“herring”), Bavarian Haring (“herring”). Late Latin haringus (whence French hareng, etc.) is borrowed from Germanic.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).