load
/loʊd/noun, verb
load is spelled L-O-A-D: 4 letters and one syllable. It appears 38 times per million words in written English, the 2,581st most frequent word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). People search “load vs lode” about 210 times a month (Google, United States). As a noun, load means “A burden; a weight to be carried” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). The plural of load is loads.
How many letters and syllables are in load?
| Letters | 4: L-O-A-D |
|---|---|
| Syllables | 1 (from its American pronunciation) |
| In writing | 38 times per million words; the 2,581st most frequent word form |
| Wrong spellings searched | none measured in search |
| Pairs people search | |
| Sounds like | |
| Rhymes with | |
| 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 load?
Load appears 38 times per million words in written English, the 2,581st most frequent word form in the list.
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
How do you pronounce load?
- US /loʊd/
- UK /ləʊd/
Load has one syllable (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-load.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Words people confuse with load
Word pairs people search, with the monthly searches for “a vs b” (G: Google, B: Bing, United States).
Sounds like: lode (Wiktionary's homophone list; some hold only in some accents).
Sources: Google and Bing searches (September 2025 to August 2026, through DataForSEO); English Wiktionary (homophones, alternative spellings).
What rhymes with load?
The 12 most written words on PlainSpell end in the same sounds as load from its last stressed vowel (/oʊd/):
Spelled with the same letters in another order: odal.
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 load
- loads plural, present, singular, he/she/it
- loading participle, present
- loaded past, participle
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
What does load mean?
The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).
noun
- 1
A burden; a weight to be carried.
I struggled up the hill with the heavy load in my rucksack.
- 2
A worry or concern to be endured, especially in the phrase a load off one's mind.
- 3
A certain number of articles or quantity of material that can be transported or processed at one time.
The truck overturned while carrying a full load of oil.
- 4
A quantity of washing put into a washing machine for a wash cycle.
I put a load on before we left.
- 5
Used to form nouns that indicate a large quantity, often corresponding to the capacity of a vehicle
- 6
colloquialA large number or amount.
I got loads of presents for my birthday!
- 7
The volume of work required to be performed.
Will our web servers be able to cope with that load?
- 8
The force exerted on a structural component such as a beam, girder, cable etc.
Each of the cross-members must withstand a tensile load of 1,000 newtons.
- 9
obsoleteA person that spends all day online. The term was originally used in the late 1980s to describe users on free Q-Link (later America Online) accounts who never signed off the system at great expense to the company.
She never logs off; she is a real LOAD!
verb
- 1
To put a load on or in (a means of conveyance or a place of storage).
The dock workers refused to load the ship.
- 2
To place in or on a conveyance or a place of storage.
The longshoremen loaded the cargo quickly.
- 3
To put a load on something.
The truck was supposed to leave at dawn, but in fact we spent all morning loading.
- 4
To receive a load.
The truck is designed to load easily.
- 5
To be placed into storage or conveyance.
The containers load quickly and easily.
- 6
To fill (a firearm or artillery) with munition.
I pulled the trigger, but nothing happened. I had forgotten to load the gun.
- 7
To insert (an item or items) into an apparatus so as to ready it for operation, such as a reel of film into a camera, sheets of paper into a printer etc.
Now that you've loaded the film [into the camera], you're ready to start shooting.
- 8
To fill (an apparatus) with raw material.
The workers loaded the blast furnace with coke and ore.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How do you abbreviate load?
Wiktionary records 3 abbreviations of load: ELT, ETL, LAP.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Load in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
| Language | Words |
|---|---|
| French | fardeau, cargaison , charge , des tas (de), paquet , charger |
| German | Last, Belastung, Ladung, Beladung, Traglast, Ladegut |
| Portuguese | fardo, carga , carregamento , monte , carregar |
| Spanish | carga, lastre, escollo, rémora , cargamento , cargar |
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 load come from?
The sense of “burden” first arose in the 13th century as a secondary meaning of Middle English lode, loade, which had the main significance of “way, course, journey”, from Old English lād (“course, journey; way, street, waterway; leading, carrying; maintenance, support”) (ultimately from Proto-Germanic *laidō (“leading, way”), Proto-Indo-European *leyt- (“to go, go forth, die”).
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).