lowdown
"lowdown" is a 7-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“lowdown” is a moderately-common English word, ranked #45,490 in English word frequency and used as a noun.
- #45,490
- frequency rank, English
- 7
- letters
- 11
- tracked misspellings
- 4
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - inside information, the story or truth.
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 | lowdown |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| Letters | 7 |
| Frequency rank | #45,490 |
| Misspellings tracked | 11 |
| Confusable pairs | 4 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “lowdown” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for lowdown is 7 letters long, classified as a noun. Corpus data places it at rank #45,490 in overall English word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it. Wiktionary records 2 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our generated misspelling index lists 11 likely wrong-spelling variants for lowdown, with forms such as "llowdown", "lodwown", and "lowddown". Each of these forms differs from the correct spelling by one small edit: a doubled letter, a dropped silent letter, or a substituted vowel. It also participates in 4 confusable-pair relationships, "London", "Loudon", "letdown", and more, since the words sound or look close enough that writers reach for the wrong one mid-sentence.
Etymologically, the entry records: Compound adjective of low + down in the sense of "humble" recorded in the 1540s, in the sense of "vulgar, far down the social scale" in 1888. Recorded as a noun in 1915 in the slang sense of secret or inside information. The correct English form is lowdown, spelled L-O-W-D-O-W-N.
Definition
- 1inside information, the story or truth.
- 2A lowlife, a despicable person.
Etymology
Compound adjective of low + down in the sense of "humble" recorded in the 1540s, in the sense of "vulgar, far down the social scale" in 1888. Recorded as a noun in 1915 in the slang sense of secret or inside information.
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: llowdown,lodwown,lowddown,lowdonw,lowdownn,lowdowwn,lowdwon,lowodwn,lowwdown,lwodown,olwdown
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of lowdown - 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.
Frequently Asked Questions
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Using “lowdown”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is L-O-W-D-O-W-N - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Don't mix it up with “London” - see the side-by-side comparison. lowdown vs London
- 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.