main thing
"main-thing" is a 9-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“main thing” is uncommon English (outside the top frequency list), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency English
- 10
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - The most important factor; the principle consideration.
Corpus desk
Index EN-main-thing · main thing · English
main thing · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
- LEN-MEGA 10 letters
- VOW-3 3 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-THIN "M" thin
- PHOTO-UNK Peer pending
Read with this headword: Spelling guide for this pattern
Desk codes from Wiktionary headword shape, FrequencyWords rank tier, confusable-pair count, generated misspelling depth, letter-cohort book size, and photo-finish peer. Not a difficulty grade.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | main thing |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| Letters | 10 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “main thing” in English
Rare enough to double-check
main thing is uncommon English outside the top frequency list, classed as anoun. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "The most important factor; the principle consideration.".
No misspelling variants are generated for main thing in our index, and the word's spelling is regular enough that our generator found nothing worth flagging. Our confusable-pair dataset has no match for it, which typically means the spelling is too distinctive to be mistaken for another word.
This entry carries no recorded etymology, so its spelling is best read as a straightforward mapping from sound to letter. The correct English form is main thing, spelled M-A-I-N- -T-H-I-N-G.
Definition
- 1The most important factor; the principle consideration.
Recorded use
Wiktionary exampleThese source excerpts show how main thing appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
‘This country just exists in perpetual conflict’. Yeah, they love that shit, man! Fascists live for perpetual war! They love that! That’s their main thing! They love forever war! What is a fascist without war?
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.