hunker
/ˈhʌŋkə/
"hunker" is a 6-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“hunker” is uncommon English (frequency #57,442 among 23,837 “H” headwords), classed as a verb. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- #57,442
- frequency rank, English
- 23,837
- “H” headwords
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - To crouch or squat close to the ground or lie down
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | hunker |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Verb |
| IPA | /ˈhʌŋkə/ |
| Letters | 6 |
| Frequency rank | #57,442 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “hunker” sits in English frequency
Rare enough to double-check
hunker is uncommon English at frequency #57,442 among 23,837 “H” headwords, classed as averb, transcribed /ˈhʌŋkə/. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 2 senses are on record.
Our edit-distance generator produced no likely misspellings for hunker, which points to an orthography that plays by predictable English rules. Our confusable-pair dataset has no match for it, a sign it's visually distinctive enough not to be mixed up with another word.
Etymologically, the entry records: Originally Scottish. Origin uncertain, but probably of Germanic origin, perhaps *hunk- a nasalised variant of *huk- (compare Scots hoonk, hounk, variants of huk, hok (“to squat, crouch”); Scots hocker (“to crouch down, hunker”)), all of North Germanic origi… The correct English form is hunker, spelled H-U-N-K-E-R.
Definition
- 1To crouch or squat close to the ground or lie down
- 2To apply oneself to a task
Etymology
Originally Scottish. Origin uncertain, but probably of Germanic origin, perhaps *hunk- a nasalised variant of *huk- (compare Scots hoonk, hounk, variants of huk, hok (“to squat, crouch”); Scots hocker (“to crouch down, hunker”)), all of North Germanic origin, from Old Norse huka (“to crouch”), from Proto-Germanic *hūkan- (“to squat”), from *hūkkan-, back-formed from the iterative *huk(k)ōn-, from Proto-Indo-European *kuk-néh₂, from *kewk- (“to curve, bend”) (also the source of high). Probable cognates include Old Norse húka, Dutch huiken, and German hocken.
This word in other languages
Definitions, pronunciation, and etymology for this entry are drawn from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org structured extract (CC BY-SA); frequency ordering uses the FrequencyWords open word-frequency list (2018 English corpus, MIT). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.
Frequently Asked Questions
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Using “hunker”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is H-U-N-K-E-R - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /ˈhʌŋkə/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Browse more English words and confusable pairs in the same reference. English words
Other uncommon English words near this rank
Data Source
Wiktionary (via kaikki.org), licensed under CC BY-SA & GFDL. Word ordering uses an open word-frequency list; misspelling variants are generated by edit-distance from the correct headword.