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hurricane

Definition, pronunciation, etymology, and usage for the English word. Free spelling reference powered by Wiktionary.

Letters

9 characters

Language

English

word origin

Source

Wiktionary

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Detailed reference entry for the English word "hurricane", 9-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 "hurricane" 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 "hurricane" for academic writing, checking homophone confusion, or exploring etymological origins, this page provides a citation-backed, free reference that requires no sign-up.

hurricane is aEnglishnoun. It means: A severe tropical cyclone; an intense storm rotating around a central eye. Pronounced /ˈhʌɹɪkən/. It ranks #6,059 in English word frequency.

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Key facts for hurricane
PropertyValue
Headwordhurricane
LanguageEnglish
Part of speechNoun
IPA/ˈhʌɹɪkən/
Letters9
Frequency rank#6,059
Misspellings tracked11
Confusable pairs0
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Frequency rank visualization

Position of hurricane in English word frequency (lower rank = more common)

Source: Wordfreq corpus

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

The English entry for hurricane is 9 letters long, classified as anoun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /ˈhʌɹɪkən/. Corpus data places it at rank #6,059 in overall English word frequency, indicating it appears regularly in written and spoken text.Wiktionary records 4 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.

Our Hunspell-derived misspelling index lists 11 documented wrong-spelling variants for hurricane, with forms such as "hhurricane", "hruricane", and "huricane". 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 is not paired with a close-neighbour confusable in our dataset, which tends to mean the word is visually distinctive enough to stand on its own.

Etymologically, the entry records: Etymology tree Taíno *hurakābor. Spanish huracánbor. English hurricane Borrowed from Spanish huracán, ultimately from Taíno *hurakā. 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 hurricane, spelled H-U-R-R-I-C-A-N-E, and any other sequence of those letters, regardless of how natural it feels, is a misspelling in standard orthography.

Definition

  1. 1
    A severe tropical cyclone; an intense storm rotating around a central eye.
  2. 2
    A severe tropical cyclone in the North Atlantic Ocean, Caribbean Sea, Gulf of Mexico, or in the eastern North Pacific off the west coast of Mexico, with winds of 119 km/h (74 miles per hour) or greater accompanied by rain, lightning, and thunder that sometimes moves into temperate latitudes.
  3. 3
    A great forceful onrush.
  4. 4
    A sweet alcoholic drink made with rum, lemon juice (or sometimes other fruit juice), and either passion fruit syrup or fassionola.

Etymology

Etymology tree Taíno *hurakābor. Spanish huracánbor. English hurricane Borrowed from Spanish huracán, ultimately from Taíno *hurakā.

This word in other languages

Common misspellings

Also misspelled as: hhurricane,hruricane,huricane,hurircane,hurrciane,hurriacne,hurricaen,hurricanne,hurriccane,hurricnae,uhrricane

Misspelling Pattern Breakdown

Relative frequency of common misspelling types for hurricane

Misspelling Variants of "hurricane"

hhurricane10hruricane9huricane8hurircane9hurrciane9hurriacne9hurricaen9hurricanne10
Misspelling Variants of "hurricane"

Frequency rank: #6,059 in English

Frequently Asked Questions

How do you spell "hurricane"?
"hurricane" is spelled H-U-R-R-I-C-A-N-E. The IPA pronunciation is /ˈhʌɹɪkən/.
What does "hurricane" mean?
As a noun, "hurricane" means: A severe tropical cyclone; an intense storm rotating around a central eye.
What are common misspellings of "hurricane"?
Common misspellings include "hhurricane", "hruricane", "huricane", "hurircane", "hurrciane". The correct spelling is "hurricane".
How do you pronounce "hurricane"?
The IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) transcription for "hurricane" is /ˈhʌɹɪkən/. Click the speaker icon on the pronunciation badge above to hear it spoken aloud where audio is available.
What is the origin of the word "hurricane"?
Etymology tree Taíno *hurakābor. Spanish huracánbor. English hurricane Borrowed from Spanish huracán, ultimately from Taíno *hurakā. See the full etymology section above for more details.
Is PlainSpell free to use?
Yes, PlainSpell is a completely free word reference. You can look up definitions, pronunciations, confusable pairs, homophones, and spelling corrections across 5 languages without any sign-up or subscription.

Nearby English words

Other entries that begin with the letter H in our English index:

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Data Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org), licensed under CC BY-SA & GFDL. Frequency data from Wordfreq. Misspellings derived from Hunspell dictionaries.