oft
/ɔft/
"oft" is a 3-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“oft” is a moderately-common English word, ranked #21,016 in English word frequency and used as an adverb.
- #21,016
- frequency rank, English
- 3
- letters
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - often; frequently; not rarely
Visual similarity to commonly confused words
How many letter changes separate each confused pair (Levenshtein distance, normalized).
Source: PlainSpell confusable corpus (Wiktionary, CC BY-SA).
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | oft |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Adverb |
| IPA | /ɔft/ |
| Letters | 3 |
| Frequency rank | #21,016 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “oft” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for oft is 3 letters long, classified as an adverb, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /ɔft/. Corpus data places it at rank #21,016 in overall English word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it. The dominant gloss from Wiktionary reads: "often; frequently; not rarely".
No generated misspelling entries exist for oft in our index, suggesting the orthography follows predictable English patterns. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "on", "or", "OH", and more, a pairing that trips writers up because the two words share enough sound or shape to blur together.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English oft (also ofte, often > Modern English often), from Old English oft (“often”), from Proto-West Germanic *oftu, *oftō, from Proto-Germanic *uftō (“often”). Cognate with Saterland Frisian oafte (“oft, often”), West Frisian oft, ofte (“oft,… The correct English form is oft, spelled O-F-T.
Definition
- 1often; frequently; not rarely
Etymology
From Middle English oft (also ofte, often > Modern English often), from Old English oft (“often”), from Proto-West Germanic *oftu, *oftō, from Proto-Germanic *uftō (“often”). Cognate with Saterland Frisian oafte (“oft, often”), West Frisian oft, ofte (“oft, often”), Dutch oft (“oft, often”), German oft (“oft, often”). More at often.
This word in other languages
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 “oft”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is O-F-T - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /ɔft/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “on” - see the side-by-side comparison. oft vs on
- Browse more English words and confusable pairs in the same reference. English words
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.