jer
/jɛə/
"jer" is a 3-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“jer” sits in 20 confusable pairs (corpus #32,458) as a noun. The look-alike neighbours are the real trap.
- #32,458
- frequency rank, English
- 796
- “J” headwords
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - either of the Proto-Slavic lax vowels /ɪ/ (front jer, ь) and /ʊ/ (back jer, ъ), which in Late Common Slavic were reduced in certain positions to ultrashort vowels [ɪ̆] and [ʊ̆] (weak jers) and then...
Corpus desk
Index EN-jer · jer · English
jer · rank #32,458 · 0 variants · 20 confusables
- FREQ-MID #32,458
- LEN-MID 3 letters
- VOW-1 1 vowel
- CONFUS-HIGH 20 pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-MID 796
- PHOTO-FINISH iz
Nearest frequency peer: iz (-1 rank slots)
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.
Frequency neighbours of confusable “jer”
Peers at similar corpus weight, separate from look-alike pairs below
- Ivanka
Ivanka
67,545 corpus weight
- iz
iz
67,544 corpus weight
- jer
jer
67,543 corpus weight
- Jimenez
Jimenez
67,542 corpus weight
- journeyman
journeyman
67,541 corpus weight
- Kandahar
Kandahar
67,540 corpus weight
What this shows Bars place “jer” against nearest ranked English headwords, not a reprint of the confusable-pair desk.
Visual similarity to commonly confused words
How many letter changes separate each confused pair (Levenshtein distance, normalized).
Source: PlainSpell confusable corpus (Wiktionary, CC BY-SA).
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | jer |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /jɛə/ |
| Letters | 3 |
| Frequency rank | #32,458 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Corpus rank beside confusables of “jer”
Easy to mix with look-alikes
The spelling risk for jer is neighbouring look-alikes ("Jr", "jo", …), not just typos; it is anoun pronounced /jɛə/. Frequency #32,458 among 796 “J” headwords. Gloss: "either of the Proto-Slavic lax vowels /ɪ/ (front jer, ь) and /ʊ/ (back jer, ъ), which in Late Common Slavic were reduced in certain positions to ultrashort vowels [ɪ̆] and [ʊ̆] (weak jers) and then...".
Zero misspellings are on record for jer in our index, and the word's spelling is regular enough that our generator found nothing worth flagging. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "Jr", "jo", "JI", and more, since the words sound or look close enough that writers reach for the wrong one mid-sentence.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Russian ер (jer) or ерь (jerʹ). The correct English form is jer, spelled J-E-R.
Definition
- 1either of the Proto-Slavic lax vowels /ɪ/ (front jer, ь) and /ʊ/ (back jer, ъ), which in Late Common Slavic were reduced in certain positions to ultrashort vowels [ɪ̆] and [ʊ̆] (weak jers) and then eventually lost.
Etymology
From Russian ер (jer) or ерь (jerʹ).
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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Similar English words by spelling shape
Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "jer", not the corpus desk frequency band.
Same letter count
Frequency-ranked English headwords with 3 letters (nearest by frequency rank).