mother
/ˈmʌð.ə/
"mother" is a 6-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“mother” is in the everyday core of English, ranked #576 in English word frequency and used as a noun.
- #576
- frequency rank, English
- 6
- letters
- 9
- tracked misspellings
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - A female parent, especially of a human; a female who parents a child (which she has given birth to, adopted, or fostered).
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 | mother |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /ˈmʌð.ə/ |
| Letters | 6 |
| Frequency rank | #576 |
| Misspellings tracked | 9 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “mother” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for mother is 6 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /ˈmʌð.ə/. Corpus data places it at rank #576 in overall English word frequency, putting it firmly in the everyday core of the language. Wiktionary records 18 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our generated misspelling index lists 9 likely wrong-spelling variants for mother, with forms such as "mmother", "mohter", and "motehr". Each variant is a distinct typo pattern an edit-distance generator flags, typically a doubled-consonant error, a silent-letter drop, or a vowel substitution. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "motor", "moths", "mover", and more, since the words sound or look close enough that writers reach for the wrong one mid-sentence.
Etymologically, the entry records: Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *méh₂tēr Proto-Germanic *mōdēr Proto-West Germanic *mōder Old English mōdor Middle English moder English mother From Middle English moder, from Old English mōdor, from Proto-West Germanic *mōder, from Proto-Germanic *mōdēr… The correct English form is mother, spelled M-O-T-H-E-R.
Definition
- 1A female parent, especially of a human; a female who parents a child (which she has given birth to, adopted, or fostered).
- 2A female who has given birth to a baby; this person in relation to her child or children.
- 3A pregnant female; mother-to-be; a female who gestates a baby.
- 4A female who donates a fertilized egg or donates a body cell which has resulted in a clone.
- 5A female ancestor.
- 6A source or origin.
- 7Something that is the greatest or most significant of its kind. (See mother of all.)
- 8A title of respect for one's mother-in-law.
- 9A term of address for one's wife.
- 10Any elderly woman, especially within a particular community.
- 11Any person or entity which performs mothering.
- 12Dregs, lees; a stringy, mucilaginous or film- or membrane-like substance (consisting of a culture of acetobacters) which develops in fermenting alcoholic liquids (such as wine, or cider), and turns the alcohol into acetic acid with the help of oxygen from the air.
- 13A locomotive which provides electrical power for a slug.
- 14The principal piece of an astrolabe, into which the others are fixed.
- 15The female superior or head of a religious house; an abbess, etc.
- 16Hysterical passion; hysteria; the uterus.
- 17A disc produced from the electrotyped master, used in manufacturing phonograph records.
- 18A person who is admired, respected, or looked up to within a particular fandom or community; see also: serve cunt
Etymology
Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *méh₂tēr Proto-Germanic *mōdēr Proto-West Germanic *mōder Old English mōdor Middle English moder English mother From Middle English moder, from Old English mōdor, from Proto-West Germanic *mōder, from Proto-Germanic *mōdēr, from Proto-Indo-European *méh₂tēr. Doublet of Madeira, mata, mater, matrix, and matter. Some have proposed that the "dregs" sense is from Middle Dutch modder (“filth”), from Proto-Germanic *muþraz (“sediment”), but modder is not known in this meaning. On the other hand, words for "mother" have developed the secondary sense of "dregs" in several Romance and Germanic languages; compare Dutch moer, French mère de vinaigre, German Essigmutter, Italian madre, Medieval Latin māter, and Spanish madre.
Synonyms
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: mmother,mohter,motehr,motherr,mothher,mothre,motther,mtoher,omther
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of mother - counted as single-character edits (an insertion, a deletion, or a substituted letter). The larger the bar, the easier the typo is to spot; one-edit slips are the ones that sneak past readers.
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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What does "mother" mean?
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Using “mother”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is M-O-T-H-E-R - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /ˈmʌð.ə/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “motor” - see the side-by-side comparison. mother vs motor
- 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.