less
/lɛs/
"less" is a 4-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“less” sits in 20 confusable pairs (corpus #305) as an adverb. The look-alike neighbours are the real trap.
- #305
- frequency rank, English
- 16,425
- “L” headwords
- 3
- tracked misspellings
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - comparative degree of little
Corpus desk
Index EN-less · less · English
less · rank #305 · 3 variants · 20 confusables
- FREQ-CORE #305
- LEN-MID 4 letters
- VOW-1 1 vowel
- CONFUS-HIGH 20 pairs
- VAR-LOW 3 variants
- BOOK-DENSE 16,425
- PHOTO-FINISH later
Nearest frequency peer: later (-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 neighbourhood for “less”
Lower corpus rank = more everyday usage (inverted bar length for readability)
- actually
actually
99,699 corpus weight
- American
American
99,698 corpus weight
- later
later
99,697 corpus weight
- less
less
99,696 corpus weight
- line
line
99,695 corpus weight
- order
order
99,694 corpus weight
What this shows Bars show where “less” sits against the nearest ranked English headwords in the FrequencyWords band, not a reprint of letter-browse containment.
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 | less |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Adverb |
| IPA | /lɛs/ |
| Letters | 4 |
| Frequency rank | #305 |
| Misspellings tracked | 3 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “less” sits in English frequency
Easy to mix with look-alikes
The spelling risk for less is neighbouring look-alikes ("Ls", "let", …), not just typos; it is anadverb pronounced /lɛs/. Frequency #305 among 16,425 “L” headwords. 3 recorded senses keep meaning in play.
Our generated misspelling index lists 3 likely wrong-spelling variants for less, with forms such as "elss", "lless", and "lses". Every one of these variants traces to a single-character edit -- an added or dropped letter, a swapped consonant, or a vowel swap -- the kind of slip a spell-checker is built to catch. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "Ls", "let", "los", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Etymologically, the entry records: Adverb From Middle English les, lesse, leasse, lasse, from Old English lǣs (“smaller, less”), from Proto-Germanic *laisiz, from Proto-Indo-European *leys- (“to shrink, grow thin, be gentle”). Cognate with Old Frisian lēs (“less”), Old Saxon lēs (“less”). Ac… The correct English form is less, spelled L-E-S-S.
Definition
- 1comparative degree of little
- 2Used for constructing syntactic diminutive comparatives of adjectives and adverbs.
- 3To a smaller extent or degree.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how less appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
I slept even less last night than I did the night before.
I like him less each time I see him.
Etymology
Adverb From Middle English les, lesse, leasse, lasse, from Old English lǣs (“smaller, less”), from Proto-Germanic *laisiz, from Proto-Indo-European *leys- (“to shrink, grow thin, be gentle”). Cognate with Old Frisian lēs (“less”), Old Saxon lēs (“less”). According to Kroonen (2013), from a northern Indo-European root Proto-Indo-European *leh₂is- or *leh₃is-, which he connects to Lithuanian liesas (“lean”). Determiner and preposition from Middle English lees, lesse, leasse, lasse, from Old English lǣssa (“less”), from Proto-Germanic *laisizan-, from Proto-Germanic *laisiz (“smaller, lesser, fewer, lower”) (see above). Cognate with Old Frisian lessa (“less”). Verb from Middle English lessen, from the determiner. Noun from Middle English lesse, from the determiner.
Antonyms
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as:
- elss
- lless
- lses
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of less - expressed in single-character edits (insert, delete, or swap one letter). Bigger bars stand out at a glance; a one-edit slip is the hardest to catch.
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.
PlainSpell is rendered directly from structured Wiktionary extracts and open word-frequency lists, no number is typed in by an editor. See our editorial standards & corrections policy, the methodology behind these numbers, or report a data error. Data current as of May 6, 2026. Primary sources: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) and FrequencyWords.
Frequently Asked Questions
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Similar English words by spelling shape
Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "less", not the corpus desk frequency band.
Data Source
Wiktionary (via kaikki.org), licensed under CC BY-SA & GFDL. Word ordering uses an open word-frequency list; misspelling variants are generated by edit-distance from the correct headword.