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PlainSpell

nut

/nʌt/noun, verb, interjection

nut is spelled N-U-T: 3 letters and one syllable. It appears 11 times per million words in written English, the 6,674th most frequent word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). As a noun, nut means “Any of various hard-shelled seeds or hard, dry fruits from various families of plants” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). The plural of nut is nuts.

How many letters and syllables are in nut?

Letters3: N-U-T
Syllables1 (from its American pronunciation)
In writing11 times per million words; the 6,674th most frequent word form
Wrong spellings searchednone measured in search
Rhymes with
Same letters

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); rhymes and same-letter words are computed by PlainSpell from its own word list.

How common is nut?

Nut appears 11 times per million words in written English, the 6,674th 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 nut?

  • US /nʌt/
  • UK [nɐt]
  • /nʊt/

Nut has one syllable (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: En-us-nut.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).

What rhymes with nut?

8 words on PlainSpell end in the same sounds as nut from its last stressed vowel (/ʌt/):

Spelled with the same letters in another order: tun.

Computed by PlainSpell from the pronunciations in the English Wiktionary (dump of September 2, 2026): a rhyme shares every sound from the last stressed vowel to the end; ordered by written frequency (wordfreq 3.1).

Forms of nut

  • nuts plural, present, singular, he/she/it
  • nutting participle, present
  • nutted participle, past

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

What does nut mean?

The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).

noun

  1. 1

    Any of various hard-shelled seeds or hard, dry fruits from various families of plants.

    There are many sorts of nuts: peanuts, cashews, pistachios, Brazil nuts and more.

  2. 2

    Such a fruit that is indehiscent.

  3. 3

    A piece of hardware, typically metal and typically hexagonal or square in shape, with a hole through it having internal screw threads, intended to be screwed onto a threaded bolt or other threaded shaft.

  4. 4

    slangThe head.

  5. 5

    slangA crazy person.

    He was driving his car like a nut.

  6. 6

    colloquialAn extreme enthusiast.

    a fashion nut – a gun nut – a sailing nut

  7. 7

    IrelandUKdatedslangAn extravagantly fashionable young man.

    ‘You are not going to be what they call a Nut, are you?’ she inquired with some anxiety, partly with the idea that a Nut would be an extravagance which her sister's small household would scarcely be justified in incurring ….

  8. 8

    archaicThe glans (structure at the extremity of the penis or of the clitoris).

  9. 9

    Alternative form of nuth (“Indian nose ring”).

verb

  1. 1

    To gather nuts.

  2. 2

    UKslangTo hit deliberately with the head; to headbutt.

  3. 3

    slangvulgarTo orgasm; to ejaculate.

  4. 4

    slangTo hit in the testicles.

  5. 5

    slangTo defeat thoroughly.

interjection

  1. 1

    ScotlandcolloquialNo.

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

Nut in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese

LanguageWords
Frenchfruit sec, noix, fruit à coque (hard-shelled fruit), écrou (that fits on a bolt), fou, folle (slang: insane person)
GermanNuss (hard-shelled fruit), Mutter (that fits on a bolt), Irre, Irrer, Spinner (slang: insane person), Birne (slang: the head)
Portuguesenoz (hard-shelled fruit), porca (that fits on a bolt), louco, doido, maluco (slang: insane person), cachola (slang: the head)
Spanishnuez (hard-shelled fruit), tuerca (that fits on a bolt), loco, chiflado, chalado, cabra loca (slang: insane person)

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 nut come from?

From Middle English note, nute, from Old English hnutu, from Proto-West Germanic *hnut, from Proto-Germanic *hnuts (“nut”), from a root *knu- possibly shared with Proto-Celtic *knūs and Latin nux (“nut”). Based on the form of the nouns and the restriction of the root to Germanic, Celtic and Italic, it has been argued to be of non-Indo-European (substrate) origin. See also West Frisian nút, Dutch noot, German Nuss, Danish nød, Swedish nöt, Norwegian nøtt.

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

What to look up after nut