Skip to main content
PlainSpell

is

/ɪz/verb, pronoun, noun

is is spelled I-S: 2 letters and one syllable. It appears 11,749 times per million words in written English, the 8th most frequent word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). People search “are vs is” about 3,600 times a month (Google, United States). As a verb, is means “third-person singular simple present indicative of be” (English Wiktionary, September 2026).

How many letters and syllables are in is?

Letters2: I-S
Syllables1 (from its American pronunciation)
In writing11,749 times per million words; the 8th most frequent word form
Wrong spellings searchednone measured in search
Pairs people search
Rhymes with

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); Bing searches in the United States: the average month from September 2025 to August 2026 (Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, read September 30, 2026); rhymes and same-letter words are computed by PlainSpell from its own word list.

How common is is?

Is appears 11,749 times per million words in written English, the 8th 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 is?

  • US /ɪz/
  • /ɘz/
  • /ɪz/

Is has one syllable (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-is.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).

Words people confuse with is

Word pairs people search, with the monthly searches for “a vs b” (G: Google, B: Bing, United States).

are vs is3,600 G
is vs us0 B

Also written: ees, i's, us.

Sources: Google and Bing searches (September 2025 to August 2026, through DataForSEO); English Wiktionary (homophones, alternative spellings).

What rhymes with is?

2 words on PlainSpell end in the same sounds as is from its last stressed vowel (/ɪz/):

Computed by PlainSpell from the pronunciations in the English Wiktionary (dump of September 2, 2026): a rhyme shares every sound from the last stressed vowel to the end; ordered by written frequency (wordfreq 3.1).

Forms of is

  • ees
  • 's
  • iz

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

What does is mean?

The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).

verb

  1. 1

    third-person singular simple present indicative of be (a form of be)

    He is a doctor.

  2. 2

    colloquialUsed in phrases with existential there (also here and where) when the semantic subject is plural.

    There is three of them there.

  3. 3

    present indicative of be; am, are, is. (a form of be)

noun

as IS
  1. 1

    Initialism of International Sign.

  2. 2

    Initialism of information system(s).

  3. 3

    Initialism of international studies.

  4. 4

    Initialism of implementation shortfall.

noun

as Is
  1. 1

    plural of I (a form of I)

  2. 2

    Abbreviation of Islands (also Is.)

pronoun

  1. 1

    Alternative spelling of us (“me”).

noun

  1. 1

    rareAlternative form of i's.

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

Where does is come from?

From Middle English is, from Old English is, from Proto-West Germanic *ist, from Proto-Germanic *isti (a form of Proto-Germanic *wesaną (“to be”)), from Proto-Indo-European *h₁ésti (“is”).

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

What to look up after is