like mad
"like-mad" is a 7-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“like mad” is uncommon English (outside the top frequency list), classed as a prep_phrase. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency English
- 8
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Like a mad person; in a furious or deranged manner; to a great or excessive degree; with great enthusiasm.
Corpus desk
Index EN-like-mad · like mad · English
like mad · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
- LEN-LONG 8 letters
- VOW-3 3 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-THIN "L" 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 | like mad |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Prep_phrase |
| Letters | 8 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “like mad” in English
Rare enough to double-check
like mad is uncommon English outside the top frequency list, classed as aprep_phrase. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "Like a mad person; in a furious or deranged manner; to a great or excessive degree; with great enthusiasm.".
The misspelling generator found no plausible variants for like mad, which points to an orthography that plays by predictable English rules. No close-neighbour confusable shows up for this headword in our dataset, since no other headword is close enough in sound or shape to pair with it.
No explicit etymology string is stored for this entry, so its spelling is best read as a straightforward mapping from sound to letter. The correct English form is like mad, spelled L-I-K-E- -M-A-D.
Definition
- 1Like a mad person; in a furious or deranged manner; to a great or excessive degree; with great enthusiasm.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how like mad appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
We poked a stick into the hornets' nest and ran like mad.
They neuer linne to scrape our goodes / till all our wealth be gone. / Which if we chaunce to sée, / excuses then are had: / But so we sée not when ’tis done, / they will denie like mad / They neuer toke away / one iote but was their owne:
Synonyms
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.