lily
/ˈlɪli/noun, adjective
lily is spelled L-I-L-Y: 4 letters and 2 syllables. It appears 8.9 times per million words in written English, the 7,672nd most frequent word form (wordfreq, 2021 data, counting Lily, the name). People search “lilly vs lily” about 480 times a month (Google, United States). As a noun, lily means “Any of several flowers in the genus Lilium of the family Liliaceae, which includes a great many ornamental species” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). The plural of lily is lilies.
How many letters and syllables are in lily?
| Letters | 4: L-I-L-Y |
|---|---|
| Syllables | 2 (from its American pronunciation) |
| In writing | 8.9 times per million words; the 7,672nd most frequent word form |
| Wrong spellings searched | none measured in search |
| Pairs people search | |
| Same letters |
Sources: letters and syllables from the English Wiktionary's hyphenation or pronunciation and the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary; written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media); Bing searches in the United States: the average month from September 2025 to August 2026 (Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, read September 30, 2026); rhymes and same-letter words are computed by PlainSpell from its own word list.
How common is lily?
Lily appears 8.9 times per million words in written English, the 7,672nd most frequent word form in the list. The list counts every capitalisation together, so this includes Lily, the name.
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
How do you pronounce lily?
- /ˈlɪli/
Lily has 2 syllables (counted from its American pronunciation in the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary).
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: En-us-lily.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Words people confuse with lily
Word pairs people search, with the monthly searches for “a vs b” (G: Google, B: Bing, United States).
Also written: lilly.
Sources: Google and Bing searches (September 2025 to August 2026, through DataForSEO); English Wiktionary (homophones, alternative spellings).
What rhymes with lily?
No other word on PlainSpell ends in the same sounds as lily.
Spelled with the same letters in another order: illy.
Computed by PlainSpell from the pronunciations in the English Wiktionary (dump of September 2, 2026): a rhyme shares every sound from the last stressed vowel to the end; ordered by written frequency (wordfreq 3.1).
Forms of lily
- lilies plural
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
What does lily mean?
The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).
noun
- 1
Any of several flowers in the genus Lilium of the family Liliaceae, which includes a great many ornamental species.
- 2
Any of several species of herbaceous flower which may or may not resemble the genus Lilium in some way, and which are not closely related to it or each other.
- 3
The flower used as a heraldic charge; also commonly used to describe the fleur-de-lis.
- 4
The end of a compass needle that should point north, traditionally often ornamented with the figure of a lily or fleur-de-lis.
- 5
A royal spade in auction bridge.
- 6
The thirtieth Lenormand card, representing calmness and maturity.
adjective
- 1
derogatoryslangWhite (as a racial epithet).
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Lily in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
In the sense flower in the genus Lilium:
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Translations are Wiktionary's, by sense; a linked word has its own PlainSpell page.
Where does lily come from?
From Middle English lilie, from Old English lilie, from Latin līlia, plural of līlium, from Ancient Greek λείριον (leírion). See there for more.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).