missile
mis·sile/ˈmɪs.(ə)l/noun
missile is spelled M-I-S-S-I-L-E, 2 syllables: mis·sile. The wrong spelling people search most is missle: about 1,310 Bing searches a month in the United States (September 2025 to August 2026), about 4 in 10 of all searches for the word. Missile is a noun meaning “Any object used as a weapon by being thrown or fired through the air, such as stone, arrow or bullet”. The plural of missile is missiles.
How many letters and syllables are in missile?
| Letters | 7: M-I-S-S-I-L-E |
|---|---|
| Syllables | 2: mis·sile |
| In writing | 14 times per million words; the 5,679th most frequent word form |
| Wrong spellings searched | 2; the most searched, missle, about 1,310 Bing searches a month (all of them) |
| Pairs people search | |
| Sounds like | |
| Rhymes with |
Sources: letters and syllables from the English Wiktionary's hyphenation or pronunciation; written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media); Bing searches in the United States: the average month from September 2025 to August 2026 (Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, read September 30, 2026); rhymes and same-letter words are computed by PlainSpell from its own word list.
How do you spell missile?
Missile is spelled M-I-S-S-I-L-E. 2 wrong spellings are searched or written often enough to measure; together they are about 4 in 10 of the searches for missile in either form.
Bing searches in the United States: the average month from September 2025 to August 2026 (Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, read September 30, 2026). Wrong spellings are taken from Wiktionary entries tagged "misspelling" and its obsolete or nonstandard forms, Wikipedia's Lists of common misspellings and the codespell dictionary, then measured. The proofreader's marks show the change that corrects each one.
How common is missile?
Missile appears 14 times per million words in written English, the 5,679th most frequent word form in the list.
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
How do you pronounce missile?
- UK /ˈmɪs.aɪl/
- US /ˈmɪs.(ə)l/
- US /-aɪl/
Missile has 2 syllables, split mis·sile in writing.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: En-us-missile.ogg, En-us-missile2.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Words people confuse with missile
Word pairs people search, with the monthly searches for “a vs b” (G: Google, B: Bing, United States).
Sounds like: missal (Wiktionary's homophone list; some hold only in some accents).
Sources: Google and Bing searches (September 2025 to August 2026, through DataForSEO); English Wiktionary (homophones, alternative spellings).
What rhymes with missile?
One word on PlainSpell end in the same sounds as missile from its last stressed vowel (/ɪsl/):
Computed by PlainSpell from the pronunciations in the English Wiktionary (dump of September 2, 2026): a rhyme shares every sound from the last stressed vowel to the end; ordered by written frequency (wordfreq 3.1).
Forms of missile
- missiles plural
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
What does missile mean?
The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).
noun
- 1
Any object used as a weapon by being thrown or fired through the air, such as stone, arrow or bullet.
The Rhodians, who used leaden bullets, were able to project their missiles twice as far as the Persian slingers, who used large stones.
- 2
A self-propelled projectile whose trajectory can be adjusted after it is launched.
That missile is explosive enough to kill hundreds.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Missile in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
| Language | Words |
|---|---|
| French | projectile , missile |
| German | Geschoss, Fluggeschoss , Lenkflugkörper, Lenkwaffe |
| Portuguese | míssil |
| Spanish | proyectil , misil |
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Translations are Wiktionary's, by sense; a linked word has its own PlainSpell page.
Where does missile come from?
From Latin missile (“thrown weapon, projectile”), neuter of missilis (“throwable, capable of being thrown”), from mittere (“to send”). From 1611. Compare Middle French missile (“projectile”), from 1636.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).