no great shakes
"no-great-shakes" is a 13-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“no great shakes” is uncommon English (outside the top frequency list), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency English
- 15
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Something unexceptional, not noteworthy or special.
Corpus desk
Index EN-no-great-shakes · no great shakes · English
no great shakes · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
- LEN-MEGA 15 letters
- VOW-5 5 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-THIN "N" thin
- PHOTO-UNK Peer pending
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.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | no great shakes |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| Letters | 15 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “no great shakes” in English
Rare enough to double-check
no great shakes is uncommon English outside the top frequency list, classed as anoun. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "Something unexceptional, not noteworthy or special.".
No generated misspelling entries exist for no great shakes in our index, typically a sign the spelling maps closely to how the word sounds. We don't track a confusable pairing for this entry, since no other headword is close enough in sound or shape to pair with it.
No borrowing history is documented for this entry, so its spelling is best read as a straightforward mapping from sound to letter. The correct English form is no great shakes, spelled N-O- -G-R-E-A-T- -S-H-A-K-E-S.
Definition
- 1Something unexceptional, not noteworthy or special.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how no great shakes appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
You're welcome to stay here, but this hut ain't no great shakes for such as you.
His tactic of pointing out the flaws of the Democrats does not mean that the Republican Party is any great shakes, as he intimates.
Definitions, pronunciation, and etymology for this entry are drawn from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org structured extract (CC BY-SA). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.