pairwise
/ˈpɛə.waɪz/
"pairwise" is a 8-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“pairwise” is uncommon English (frequency #56,962 among 4,417 “P” headwords), classed as an adjective. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- #56,962
- frequency rank, English
- 4,417
- “P” headwords
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Occurring in pairs; two at a time.
Corpus desk
Index EN-pairwise · pairwise · English
pairwise · rank #56,962 · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-RARE #56,962
- LEN-LONG 8 letters
- VOW-4 4 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-MID 4,417
- PHOTO-FINISH pally
Nearest frequency peer: pally (+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.
Long-tail ranks near “pairwise”
Sparse band: bars invert rank so rarer forms read shorter
- oud
oud
43,046 corpus weight
- overdosing
overdosing
43,044 corpus weight
- paddies
paddies
43,041 corpus weight
- pairwise
pairwise
43,039 corpus weight
- pally
pally
43,038 corpus weight
- param
param
43,037 corpus weight
What this shows Long-tail view: where “pairwise” sits against similarly uncommon English ranks.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | pairwise |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Adjective |
| IPA | /ˈpɛə.waɪz/ |
| Letters | 8 |
| Frequency rank | #56,962 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “pairwise” in English
Rare enough to double-check
pairwise is uncommon English at frequency #56,962 among 4,417 “P” headwords, classed as anadjective, transcribed /ˈpɛə.waɪz/. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "Occurring in pairs; two at a time.".
Our edit-distance generator produced no likely misspellings for pairwise, suggesting the orthography follows predictable English patterns. It is not paired with a close-neighbour confusable in our dataset, which usually means its spelling is distinct enough that readers don't reach for a similar-looking word instead.
Etymologically, the entry records: From pair + -wise. The correct English form is pairwise, spelled P-A-I-R-W-I-S-E.
Definition
- 1Occurring in pairs; two at a time.
Recorded use
Wiktionary exampleThese source excerpts show how pairwise appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
They proceeded to make pairwise comparisons.
Etymology
From pair + -wise.
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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Similar English words by spelling shape
Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "pairwise", not the corpus desk frequency band.
Same letter count
Frequency-ranked English headwords with 8 letters (nearest by frequency rank).