midst
/mɪdst/
"midst" is a 5-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“midst” is a regularly-used English word, ranked #8,453 in English word frequency and used as a noun.
- #8,453
- frequency rank, English
- 5
- letters
- 8
- tracked misspellings
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - A place in the middle of something; may be used of a literal or metaphorical location.
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 | midst |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /mɪdst/ |
| Letters | 5 |
| Frequency rank | #8,453 |
| Misspellings tracked | 8 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “midst” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for midst is 5 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /mɪdst/. Corpus data places it at rank #8,453 in overall English word frequency, indicating it appears regularly in written and spoken text. The dominant gloss from Wiktionary reads: "A place in the middle of something; may be used of a literal or metaphorical location.".
Our generated misspelling index lists 8 likely wrong-spelling variants for midst, with forms such as "imdst", "mdist", and "middst". Every one of these variants traces to a single-character edit -- an added or dropped letter, a swapped consonant, or a vowel swap -- the kind of slip a spell-checker is built to catch. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "mit", "MST", "most", and more, since the words sound or look close enough that writers reach for the wrong one mid-sentence.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English middes, midst, myddest (“middle”), from Old English midde, reshaped in Middle English phrases like in middes (“in the middle”) by analogy with adverbs in -(e)s; also compare Old English on middan, tōmiddes. Forms in -(e)st are probably d… The correct English form is midst, spelled M-I-D-S-T.
Definition
- 1A place in the middle of something; may be used of a literal or metaphorical location.
Etymology
From Middle English middes, midst, myddest (“middle”), from Old English midde, reshaped in Middle English phrases like in middes (“in the middle”) by analogy with adverbs in -(e)s; also compare Old English on middan, tōmiddes. Forms in -(e)st are probably due to influence of superlatives.
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: imdst,mdist,middst,midsst,midstt,midts,misdt,mmidst
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of midst - measured in single-character edits (insert, delete, or substitute a letter). Larger bars are easier to catch; one-edit slips are the sneakiest.
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 “midst”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is M-I-D-S-T - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /mɪdst/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “mit” - see the side-by-side comparison. midst vs mit
- 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.