intension
/ɪnˈtɛnʃən/
"intension" is a 9-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“intension” is uncommon English (outside the top frequency list), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency English
- 9
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - intensity or the act of becoming intense.
Corpus desk
Index EN-intension · intension · English
intension · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
- LEN-LONG 9 letters
- VOW-4 4 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-THIN "I" thin
- PHOTO-UNK Peer pending
Read with this headword: Spelling guide for this pattern
Desk codes from Wiktionary headword shape, FrequencyWords rank tier, confusable-pair count, generated misspelling depth, letter-cohort book size, and photo-finish peer. Not a difficulty grade.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | intension |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /ɪnˈtɛnʃən/ |
| Letters | 9 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “intension” in English
Rare enough to double-check
intension is uncommon English outside the top frequency list, classed as anoun, transcribed /ɪnˈtɛnʃən/. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 3 senses are on record.
The misspelling generator found no plausible variants for intension, and the word's spelling is regular enough that our generator found nothing worth flagging. It is not paired with a close-neighbour confusable in our dataset, since nothing in our dataset looks or sounds close enough to cause mix-ups.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Latin intēnsiō (“straining, effort; intensifying”), from intēnsus (“stretched”), perfect passive participle of intendō (“strain or stretch toward”). The correct English form is intension, spelled I-N-T-E-N-S-I-O-N.
Definition
- 1intensity or the act of becoming intense.
- 2Any property or quality connoted by a word, phrase or other symbol, contrasted with actual instances in the real world to which the term applies.
- 3A straining, stretching, or bending; the state of being strained.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how intension appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
Sounds […] likewise do rise and fall with the intension or remission of the wind.
'Is a plant', 'has a trunk', 'has leaves' are intensions of the concept tree. Its extension is the set of all trees existing in the real world.
Etymology
From Latin intēnsiō (“straining, effort; intensifying”), from intēnsus (“stretched”), perfect passive participle of intendō (“strain or stretch toward”).
Definitions, pronunciation, and etymology for this entry are drawn from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org structured extract (CC BY-SA). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.