motioning

noun

"motioning" is a 9-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.

The verdict

“motioning” is uncommon English (frequency #85,541 among 4,057 “M” headwords), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.

#85,541
frequency rank, English
4,057
“M” headwords

According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - movement

Corpus desk

Index EN-motioning · motioning · English

motioning · rank #85,541 · 0 variants · 0 confusables

  • FREQ-RARE #85,541
  • LEN-LONG 9 letters
  • VOW-4 4 vowels
  • CONFUS-0 No pairs
  • VAR-0 0 variants
  • BOOK-MID 4,057
  • PHOTO-FINISH Morimoto

Nearest frequency peer: Morimoto (-1 rank slots)

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.

Long-tail ranks near “motioning”

Sparse band: bars invert rank so rarer forms read shorter

corpus weight

What this shows Long-tail view: where “motioning” sits against similarly uncommon English ranks.

Source FrequencyWords open word-frequency list As of September 3, 2026
Key facts for motioning
PropertyValue
Headwordmotioning
LanguageEnglish
Part of speechNoun
Letters9
Frequency rank#85,541
Misspellings tracked0
Confusable pairs0
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Long-tail rank of “motioning” in English

Every-word frequency runs from the handful of words we use constantly (left) to the long tail used once in a blue moon (right).motioningfalls in this rarity band:

#1#100#1K#10K#100K
← used constantlyrarely used →

The axis is logarithmic, with each marked tick roughly ten times rarer than the last. Rare peers in the same band: “Morimoto” (#85,540), “multifocal” (#85,545), “Moncrief” (#85,534). Among 4,057 “M” headwords, “motioning” is #85,541. Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list.

Rare enough to double-check

motioning is uncommon English at frequency #85,541 among 4,057 “M” headwords, classed as anoun. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "movement".

The misspelling generator found no plausible variants for motioning, since its letter pattern doesn't lend itself to common typo substitutions. This headword has no recorded confusable partner, since its spelling is unusual enough that it doesn't cluster with a lookalike.

No documented word history exists for this headword, leaving phoneme-to-grapheme mapping as the best guide to its spelling rather than a borrowing history. The correct English form is motioning, spelled M-O-T-I-O-N-I-N-G.

Definition

  1. 1
    movement

Recorded use

Wiktionary example

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

  1. F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Beautiful and Damned By gesture she was pretending and by words and by the scarcely perceptible motionings of her eyelids […]

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

How do you spell "motioning"?
"motioning" is spelled M-O-T-I-O-N-I-N-G.
What does "motioning" mean?
As a noun, "motioning" means: movement
What language does "motioning" come from?
"motioning" is a English word. You can look up definitions, pronunciations, and spelling data for this and other words across English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and German on PlainSpell.
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.

Similar English words by spelling shape

Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "motioning", not the corpus desk frequency band.

Same letter count

Frequency-ranked English headwords with 9 letters (nearest by frequency rank).

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list