# oboe

> English word · Noun · IPA /ˈəʊbəʊ/ · frequency rank #42,302

## Definitions
1. A soprano and melody wind instrument in the modern orchestra and wind ensemble. It is a smaller instrument and generally made of grenadilla wood. It is a member of the double reed family.

## Etymology
An earlier form in English is hautboy, but the spelling oboe was adopted into English ca. 1770 from the Italian oboè, a transliteration in that language's orthography of the 17th-century pronunciation of the French word hautbois, a compound word made of haut (“high, loud, high-pitched”) and bois (“wood, woodwind”).

## Easily confused with
- **oo** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/oboe-vs-oo)
- **OE** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/oboe-vs-oe)
- **one** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/oboe-vs-one)
- **owe** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/oboe-vs-owe)
- **ore** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/oboe-vs-ore)
- **ooh** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/oboe-vs-ooh)
- **ole** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/oboe-vs-ole)
- **OOO** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/oboe-vs-ooo)
- **ode** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/oboe-vs-ode)
- **ono** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/oboe-vs-ono)
- **oof** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/oboe-vs-oof)
- **OOP** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/oboe-vs-oop)
- **obs** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/oboe-vs-obs)
- **oot** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/oboe-vs-oot)
- **OOC** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/oboe-vs-ooc)
- **oso** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/oboe-vs-oso)
- **once** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/oboe-vs-once)
- **odor** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/oboe-vs-odor)
- **oooh** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/oboe-vs-oooh)
- **ogre** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/oboe-vs-ogre)

## Common misspellings (4)
`booe`, `obboe`, `obeo`, `oobe`

## Source
Compiled from Wiktionary via kaikki.org (CC BY-SA). Data vintage: 2026-05-06.
Canonical page: https://plainspell.com/en/word/oboe