negligible
/ˈnɛɡlɪd͡ʒɪbəl/adjective
negligible is spelled N-E-G-L-I-G-I-B-L-E. The wrong spelling people search most is negligable: about 300 Bing searches a month in the United States (September 2025 to August 2026), about 1 in 12 of all searches for the word. Negligible is an adjective meaning “Able to be neglected, ignored or excluded from consideration; too small or unimportant to be of concern”.
How many letters and syllables are in negligible?
| Letters | 10: N-E-G-L-I-G-I-B-L-E |
|---|---|
| Syllables | 4 (from its American pronunciation) |
| In writing | 2.5 times per million words; the 17,342nd most frequent word form |
| Wrong spellings searched | 3; the most searched, negligable, about 300 Bing searches a month (all of them) |
Sources: letters and syllables from the English Wiktionary's hyphenation or pronunciation and the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary; 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).
How do you spell negligible?
Negligible is spelled N-E-G-L-I-G-I-B-L-E. 3 wrong spellings are searched or written often enough to measure; together they are about 1 in 10 of the searches for negligible 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 negligible?
Negligible appears 2.5 times per million words in written English, the 17,342nd 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 negligible?
- /ˈnɛɡlɪd͡ʒɪbəl/
Negligible has 4 syllables (counted from its American pronunciation in the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary).
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: LL-Q1860_(eng)-Vealhurl-negligible.wav, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Forms of negligible
- more negligible comparative
- most negligible superlative
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
What does negligible mean?
The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).
adjective
- 1
Able to be neglected, ignored or excluded from consideration; too small or unimportant to be of concern.
We found errors, but their effects were negligible.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Negligible in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
In the sense able to be ignored or excluded:
| Language | Words |
|---|---|
| French | négligeable, insignifiant |
| German | vernachlässigbar |
| Portuguese | insignificante, negligenciável, desprezável |
| Spanish | insignificante, desdeñable, negligible, despreciable |
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 negligible come from?
From negligence/negligent + -ible, as if from New Latin *negligibilis, from Latin neglegō (“to neglect”) + -ibilis (“-ible”).
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).