lait
"lait" is a 4-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“lait” is uncommon English (frequency #71,646 among 2,297 “L” headwords), classed as a verb. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- #71,646
- frequency rank, English
- 2,297
- “L” headwords
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - To seek; search for; inquire.
Corpus desk
Index EN-lait · lait · English
lait · rank #71,646 · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-RARE #71,646
- LEN-MID 4 letters
- VOW-2 2 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-MID 2,297
- PHOTO-FINISH Lafitte
Nearest frequency peer: Lafitte (-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.
Long-tail ranks near “lait”
Sparse band: bars invert rank so rarer forms read shorter
- kye
kye
28,360 corpus weight
- Kyler
Kyler
28,359 corpus weight
- Laconia
Laconia
28,358 corpus weight
- Ladysmith
Ladysmith
28,357 corpus weight
- Lafitte
Lafitte
28,356 corpus weight
- lait
lait
28,355 corpus weight
What this shows Long-tail view: where “lait” sits against similarly uncommon English ranks.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | lait |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Verb |
| Letters | 4 |
| Frequency rank | #71,646 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “lait” in English
Rare enough to double-check
lait is uncommon English at frequency #71,646 among 2,297 “L” headwords, classed as averb. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "To seek; search for; inquire.".
lait has no tracked misspelling variants, since its letter sequence doesn't invite the usual edit-distance slips. We don't track a confusable pairing for this entry, since nothing in our dataset looks or sounds close enough to cause mix-ups.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English laiten, leiten, from Old Norse leita (“to seek, search, inquire”), from Proto-Germanic *wlaitōną (“to look out, see”), from Proto-Indo-European *wel- (“to see”). Cognate with Norwegian Nynorsk leita (“to search”), Icelandic leita (“to se… The correct English form is lait, spelled L-A-I-T.
Definition
- 1To seek; search for; inquire.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how lait appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
By neeght, o' my bed, I laited him, at my sowl luvs : I laited him, but I dudn't find um.
The other day I heard a girl hailing from the moorlands of Yorkshire remark that she had "laited a long time for the children, but could not find them," evidently meaning she had sought for them. Is this word common to Yorkshire?
Etymology
From Middle English laiten, leiten, from Old Norse leita (“to seek, search, inquire”), from Proto-Germanic *wlaitōną (“to look out, see”), from Proto-Indo-European *wel- (“to see”). Cognate with Norwegian Nynorsk leita (“to search”), Icelandic leita (“to search”), Swedish leta (“to search, hunt, forage”), Old English wlātian (“to gaze, observe, look upon, behold”).
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 "lait", not the corpus desk frequency band.
Same letter count
Frequency-ranked English headwords with 4 letters (nearest by frequency rank).