mooch
/muːt͡ʃ/
"mooch" is a 5-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“mooch” is an uncommon English word, ranked #57,569 in English word frequency and used as a verb.
- #57,569
- frequency rank, English
- 5
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - To wander around aimlessly, often causing irritation to others.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | mooch |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Verb |
| IPA | /muːt͡ʃ/ |
| Letters | 5 |
| Frequency rank | #57,569 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “mooch” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for mooch is 5 letters long, classified as a verb, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /muːt͡ʃ/. Corpus data places it at rank #57,569 in overall English word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it. Wiktionary records 3 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our edit-distance generator produced no likely misspellings for mooch, and the word's spelling is regular enough that our generator found nothing worth flagging. This entry stands alone in our confusable dataset, a sign it's visually distinctive enough not to be mixed up with another word.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English moochen, mouchen (“to pretend poverty”), from Old French muchier, mucier, mucer (“to skulk, hide, conceal”), from Frankish *mukkjan (“to hide, conceal oneself”), from Proto-Germanic *mukjaną, *mūkōną (“to hide, ambush”), from Proto-Indo-… The correct English form is mooch, spelled M-O-O-C-H.
Definition
- 1To wander around aimlessly, often causing irritation to others.
- 2To beg, cadge, or sponge; to exploit or take advantage of others for personal gain.
- 3To steal or filch.
Etymology
From Middle English moochen, mouchen (“to pretend poverty”), from Old French muchier, mucier, mucer (“to skulk, hide, conceal”), from Frankish *mukkjan (“to hide, conceal oneself”), from Proto-Germanic *mukjaną, *mūkōną (“to hide, ambush”), from Proto-Indo-European *(s)mūg-, *(s)mewgʰ- (“swindler, thief”). Cognate with Old High German mūhhōn (“to store, cache, plunder”), Middle High German muchen, mucken (“to hide, stash”), Middle English müchen, michen (“to rob, steal, pilfer”). More at mitch. Alternate etymology derives mooch from Middle English mucchen (“to hoard, be stingy”, literally “to hide coins in one's nightcap”), from Middle English mucche (“nightcap”), from Middle Dutch mutse (“cap, nightcap”), from Medieval Latin almucia (“nightcap”), of unknown origin, possibly Arabic. More at mutch, amice.
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); 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 “mooch”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is M-O-O-C-H - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /muːt͡ʃ/ (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.