know-it-all
/ˈnəʉ.ɪt.oːl/
"know-it-all" is a 9-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“know-it-all” is uncommon English (outside the top frequency list), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency English
- 11
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Someone who claims to be knowledgeable or an expert in something, obnoxiously dismissing the opinions, advice, suggestions, etc. of others.
Corpus desk
Index EN-know-it-all · know-it-all · English
know-it-all · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
- LEN-MEGA 11 letters
- VOW-3 3 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-THIN "K" 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 | know-it-all |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /ˈnəʉ.ɪt.oːl/ |
| Letters | 11 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “know-it-all” in English
Rare enough to double-check
know-it-all is uncommon English outside the top frequency list, classed as anoun, transcribed /ˈnəʉ.ɪt.oːl/. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "Someone who claims to be knowledgeable or an expert in something, obnoxiously dismissing the opinions, advice, suggestions, etc. of others.".
know-it-all has no tracked misspelling variants, which points to an orthography that plays by predictable English rules. 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: From know + it + all. The correct English form is know-it-all, spelled K-N-O-W---I-T---A-L-L.
Definition
- 1Someone who claims to be knowledgeable or an expert in something, obnoxiously dismissing the opinions, advice, suggestions, etc. of others.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how know-it-all appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
We had it all figured out, but this know-it-all marched in with "the correct way of solving it", leaving our experiment in shambles.
The same holds true for supporting details—they help you to learn more about a topic. Be a know it all by sharing these details and supporting details with friends.
Etymology
From know + it + all.
Synonyms
Antonyms
This word in other languages
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.