machine gun
/məˈʃiːn ɡʌn/
"machine-gun" is a 10-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“machine gun” is outside the top-ranked English vocabulary, used as a noun - the kind of word writers most often double-check.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency English
- 11
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - A type of fully automatic firearm that fires bullets in rapid succession by a single action of the trigger and is capable of sustained fire.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | machine gun |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /məˈʃiːn ɡʌn/ |
| Letters | 11 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “machine gun” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for machine gun is 11 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /məˈʃiːn ɡʌn/. It sits outside the most-frequent rank tiers, which is often why uncommon words generate more spelling variants per reader. The dominant gloss from Wiktionary reads: "A type of fully automatic firearm that fires bullets in rapid succession by a single action of the trigger and is capable of sustained fire.".
No misspelling variants are generated for machine gun in our index, suggesting the orthography follows predictable English patterns. No confusable counterpart is on file for this word, suggesting its spelling stands apart enough that readers rarely confuse it with something else.
No documented word history exists for this headword, so spelling patterns must be inferred from the word's phoneme-to-grapheme mapping rather than from a documented borrowing chain. The correct English form is machine gun, spelled M-A-C-H-I-N-E- -G-U-N.
Definition
- 1A type of fully automatic firearm that fires bullets in rapid succession by a single action of the trigger and is capable of sustained fire.
This word in other languages
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.
Frequently Asked Questions
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Using “machine gun”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is M-A-C-H-I-N-E- -G-U-N - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /məˈʃiːn ɡʌn/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- 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.