mark out

verb

By · According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA) ·

"mark-out" is a 7-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.

The verdict

“mark out” is uncommon English (outside the top frequency list), classed as a verb. The kind of spelling people second-guess.

Unranked
below top-frequency English
8
letters

According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - To mark the boundaries of an area—used of land, wood, metal, etc.—before working upon it.

Corpus desk

Index EN-mark-out · mark out · English

mark out · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables

  • FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
  • LEN-LONG 8 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.

Key facts for mark out
PropertyValue
Headwordmark out
LanguageEnglish
Part of speechVerb
Letters8
Misspellings tracked0
Confusable pairs0
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Long-tail rank of “mark out” in English

mark outranks outside the top 100,000 English headwords, in the long tail of specialist, archaic, or seldom-used vocabulary, exactly the territory where a reader stops mid-sentence to double-check spelling.

Beyond rank #100,000. Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list.

Rare enough to double-check

mark out is uncommon English outside the top frequency list, classed as averb. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 4 senses are on record.

We couldn't generate a plausible misspelling set for mark out, and the word's spelling is regular enough that our generator found nothing worth flagging. This entry stands alone in our confusable dataset, since no other headword is close enough in sound or shape to pair with it.

No borrowing history is documented for this entry, 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 mark out, spelled M-A-R-K- -O-U-T.

Definition

  1. 1
    To mark the boundaries of an area—used of land, wood, metal, etc.—before working upon it.
  2. 2
    To classify.
  3. 3
    To obliterate or cancel with a mark.
  4. 4
    To distinguish.

Recorded use

Wiktionary examples

These source excerpts show how mark out appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.

  1. I don't want to be marked out as a failure.
  2. to mark out an item in an account

This word in other languages

enmarcar(Español)

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

How do you spell "mark out"?
"mark out" is spelled M-A-R-K- -O-U-T.
What does "mark out" mean?
As a verb, "mark out" means: To mark the boundaries of an area—used of land, wood, metal, etc.—before working upon it.
What language does "mark out" come from?
"mark out" is a English word. PlainSpell's reference spans five languages -- English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and German -- with definitions, pronunciations, and spelling data for each.
Is PlainSpell free to use?
Yes, PlainSpell is a completely free word reference. You can look up definitions, pronunciations, confusable pairs, homophones, and spelling corrections across 5 languages without any sign-up or subscription.

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list