nicotine
/ˈnɪkətiːn/
"nicotine" is a 8-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“nicotine” has 11 generated spelling variants in the English index at frequency #14,596. The variants make it a useful spelling check.
- #14,596
- frequency rank, English
- 24,391
- “N” headwords
- 11
- tracked misspellings
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - An alkaloid (C₁₀H₁₄N₂), commonly occurring in the tobacco plant.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | nicotine |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /ˈnɪkətiːn/ |
| Letters | 8 |
| Frequency rank | #14,596 |
| Misspellings tracked | 11 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “nicotine” sits in English frequency
A misspelling magnet
The generator records 11 spelling variants around nicotine (IPA /ˈnɪkətiːn/), anoun. Corpus frequency is #14,596 among 24,391 “N” headwords. Wiktionary lists 2 senses, so context still picks the gloss.
Our generated misspelling index lists 11 likely wrong-spelling variants for nicotine, with forms such as "incotine", "nciotine", and "niccotine". Every one of these variants traces to a single-character edit -- an added or dropped letter, a swapped consonant, or a vowel swap -- the kind of slip a spell-checker is built to catch. It is not paired with a close-neighbour confusable in our dataset, which tends to mean the word is visually distinctive enough to stand on its own.
Etymologically, the entry records: Borrowed from French nicotine, equivalent to Nicot + -ine, named after Jean Nicot (1530–1604), the French ambassador to Portugal, who sent tobacco seeds back to France in 1561. The etymology of the surname itself is unclear. The correct English form is nicotine, spelled N-I-C-O-T-I-N-E.
Definition
- 1An alkaloid (C₁₀H₁₄N₂), commonly occurring in the tobacco plant.
- 2Tobacco or cigarettes.
Etymology
Borrowed from French nicotine, equivalent to Nicot + -ine, named after Jean Nicot (1530–1604), the French ambassador to Portugal, who sent tobacco seeds back to France in 1561. The etymology of the surname itself is unclear.
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: incotine,nciotine,niccotine,nicoitne,nicotien,nicotinne,nicotnie,nicottine,nictoine,nioctine,nnicotine
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of nicotine - measured in single-character edits (insert, delete, or substitute a letter). Larger bars are easier to catch; one-edit slips are the sneakiest.
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 “nicotine”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is N-I-C-O-T-I-N-E - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /ˈnɪkətiːn/ (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
Same frequency band
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.