OK
/ˌəʊˈkeɪ/
"ok" is a 2-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“OK” sits in 20 confusable pairs (corpus #750) as a noun. The look-alike neighbours are the real trap.
- #750
- frequency rank, English
- 1,431
- “O” headwords
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 2, 2026) - Endorsement; approval; acceptance; acquiescence.
Corpus desk
Index EN-ok · OK · English
OK · rank #750 · 0 variants · 20 confusables
- FREQ-CORE #750
- LEN-SHORT 2 letters
- VOW-1 1 vowel
- CONFUS-HIGH 20 pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-MID 1,431
- PHOTO-FINISH official
Nearest frequency peer: official (-1 rank slots)
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.
Frequency neighbourhood for “OK”
Lower corpus rank = more everyday usage (inverted bar length for readability)
- follow
follow
99,254 corpus weight
- lives
lives
99,253 corpus weight
- official
official
99,252 corpus weight
- OK
OK
99,251 corpus weight
- production
production
99,250 corpus weight
- rate
rate
99,249 corpus weight
What this shows Bars show where “OK” sits against the nearest ranked English headwords in the FrequencyWords band, not a reprint of letter-browse containment.
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 | OK |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /ˌəʊˈkeɪ/ |
| Letters | 2 |
| Frequency rank | #750 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “OK” sits in English frequency
Easy to mix with look-alikes
The spelling risk for OK is neighbouring look-alikes ("on", "or", …), not just typos; it is anoun pronounced /ˌəʊˈkeɪ/. Frequency #750 among 1,431 “O” headwords. Gloss: "Endorsement; approval; acceptance; acquiescence.".
Zero misspellings are on record for OK in our index, a sign its spelling follows regular English conventions. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "on", "or", "op", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Etymologically, the entry records: Origin disputed. Wikipedia lists many possible etymologies, of which the most widely accepted is that it is an abbreviation of oll/orl korrect, a comical spelling of all correct, which first appeared in print in The Boston Morning Post on March 23, 1839, as… The correct English form is OK, spelled O-K.
Definition
- 1Endorsement; approval; acceptance; acquiescence.
Recorded use
Wiktionary exampleThese source excerpts show how OK appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
We can start as soon as we get the OK.
Etymology
Origin disputed. Wikipedia lists many possible etymologies, of which the most widely accepted is that it is an abbreviation of oll/orl korrect, a comical spelling of all correct, which first appeared in print in The Boston Morning Post on March 23, 1839, as part of a fad for similar fanciful abbreviations in the United States during the late 1830s. The expression became popular through its use in the presidential campaign of Martin Van Buren in 1840, who was nicknamed Old Kinderhook, and then slowly acquired other meanings. The Choctaw word oke, okeh (“it is so”), common in Choctaw translations of the Bible, could also explain OK's variety of affirmative definitions. Additionally, okeh was the most common etymology of okay in dictionaries until the 1960s, and linguistically predates Boston's O.K.. However, this theory suffers from the fact that the Choctaw language was relatively obscure and generally spoken (sometimes in a pidgin form) mainly with African-American slaves.
Antonyms
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.
PlainSpell is rendered directly from structured Wiktionary extracts and open word-frequency lists, no number is typed in by an editor. See our editorial standards & corrections policy, the methodology behind these numbers, or report a data error. Data current as of September 2, 2026. Primary sources: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) and FrequencyWords.
Frequently Asked Questions
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What to do next
You've looked up "OK". Here's where to go from here.
- "OK" maps to 20 confusable pairs in this vintage; the highest-scored is "on". View pair
- Usage frequency rank #750 among English headwords in this corpus. Corpus statistics
- Browse more English words in the "O" letter cohort. O–Z browse
- PlainSpell rotates a curated Word of the Day from the English corpus, a passive way to discover vocabulary. Word of the Day
PlainSpell is a reference corpus, not spelling advice. Verify unusual forms in context.
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.