little
/ˈlɪ.tl̩/
"little" is a 6-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“little” is in the everyday core of English, ranked #173 in English word frequency and used as an adjective.
- #173
- frequency rank, English
- 6
- letters
- 7
- tracked misspellings
- 10
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - Small in size.
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 | little |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Adjective |
| IPA | /ˈlɪ.tl̩/ |
| Letters | 6 |
| Frequency rank | #173 |
| Misspellings tracked | 7 |
| Confusable pairs | 10 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “little” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for little is 6 letters long, classified as an adjective, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /ˈlɪ.tl̩/. Corpus data places it at rank #173 in overall English word frequency, putting it firmly in the everyday core of the language. Wiktionary records 12 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our generated misspelling index lists 7 likely wrong-spelling variants for little, with forms such as "ilttle", "litle", and "litlte". 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 10 confusable-pair relationships, "lotte", "Lottie", "littlest", and more, a pairing that trips writers up because the two words share enough sound or shape to blur together.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English litel, from Old English lyttel, lȳtel, from Proto-West Germanic *lūtil, from Proto-Germanic *lūtilaz (“tending to stoop, crouched, little”), from Proto-Indo-European *lewd- (“to bend, bent, small”), equivalent to lout + -le. Cognate with… The correct English form is little, spelled L-I-T-T-L-E.
Definition
- 1Small in size.
- 2Small in size.
- 3Insignificant, trivial.
- 4Insignificant, trivial.
- 5Very young, of childhood age.
- 6Younger.
- 7Used with the name of a place, especially of a country or its capital, to denote a neighborhood whose residents or storekeepers are from that place.
- 8Used with the name of a place, especially of a country or its capital, to denote a neighborhood whose residents or storekeepers are from that place.
- 9Having few members.
- 10Operating on a small scale.
- 11Short in duration; brief.
- 12Small in extent of views or sympathies; narrow, shallow, contracted; mean, illiberal, ungenerous.
Etymology
From Middle English litel, from Old English lyttel, lȳtel, from Proto-West Germanic *lūtil, from Proto-Germanic *lūtilaz (“tending to stoop, crouched, little”), from Proto-Indo-European *lewd- (“to bend, bent, small”), equivalent to lout + -le. Cognate with Dutch luttel, regional German lütt and lützel, Saterland Frisian litje, West Frisian lyts, Low German lütt, lüttje. Related also to Old English lūtan (“to bow, bend low”); and perhaps to Old English lytiġ (“deceitful”), Gothic 𐌻𐌹𐌿𐍄𐍃 (liuts, “deceitful”); compare also Icelandic lítill (“little”), Faroese lítil, Swedish liten, Danish liden, lille, Gothic 𐌻𐌴𐌹𐍄𐌹𐌻𐍃 (leitils), which appear to have a different root vowel. More at lout.
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: ilttle,litle,litlte,littel,littlle,llittle,ltitle
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of little - measured in single-character edits (insert, delete, or substitute a letter). Larger bars are easier to catch; one-edit slips are the sneakiest.
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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Using “little”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is L-I-T-T-L-E - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /ˈlɪ.tl̩/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “lotte” - see the side-by-side comparison. little vs lotte
- Browse more English words and confusable pairs in the same reference. English words
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.