ked
"ked" is a 3-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“ked” is uncommon English (frequency #71,624 among 1,236 “K” headwords), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- #71,624
- frequency rank, English
- 1,236
- “K” headwords
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Any of the family Hippoboscidae of obligate parasites, especially the sheep ked, Melophagus ovinus.
Corpus desk
Index EN-ked · ked · English
ked · rank #71,624 · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-RARE #71,624
- LEN-MID 3 letters
- VOW-1 1 vowel
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-MID 1,236
- PHOTO-FINISH Kerman
Nearest frequency peer: Kerman (+2 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.
Long-tail ranks near “ked”
Sparse band: bars invert rank so rarer forms read shorter
- Kaneko
Kaneko
28,381 corpus weight
- ked
ked
28,377 corpus weight
- Kerman
Kerman
28,375 corpus weight
- Kevorkian
Kevorkian
28,373 corpus weight
- keyring
keyring
28,372 corpus weight
- khair
khair
28,371 corpus weight
What this shows Long-tail view: where “ked” sits against similarly uncommon English ranks.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | ked |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| Letters | 3 |
| Frequency rank | #71,624 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “ked” in English
Rare enough to double-check
ked is uncommon English at frequency #71,624 among 1,236 “K” headwords, classed as anoun. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "Any of the family Hippoboscidae of obligate parasites, especially the sheep ked, Melophagus ovinus.".
The misspelling generator found no plausible variants for ked, and the word's spelling is regular enough that our generator found nothing worth flagging. Our confusable-pair dataset has no match for it, since nothing in our dataset looks or sounds close enough to cause mix-ups.
Etymologically, the entry records: Of unknown origin. Possibly from or related to Old Danish keed (“sheep ked, louse-fly”). The correct English form is ked, spelled K-E-D.
Definition
- 1Any of the family Hippoboscidae of obligate parasites, especially the sheep ked, Melophagus ovinus.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how ked appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
Pouring with tobacco liquor is fatal to these insects, and also to the ked, Hippobosca ovina, and to the tick, Acarus reduvius, if it fairly reach them.
The common differential diagnoses include cutaneous myiasis, sheep scab and lice; however, keds are readily visible to the naked eye.[…]Adult keds are 4-6 mm long, dark red and readily visible on the neck and forelimbs.
Etymology
Of unknown origin. Possibly from or related to Old Danish keed (“sheep ked, louse-fly”).
Synonyms
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 "ked", not the corpus desk frequency band.
Same letter count
Frequency-ranked English headwords with 3 letters (nearest by frequency rank).