panda
/ˈpændə/
"panda" is a 5-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“panda” is a moderately-common English word, ranked #12,118 in English word frequency and used as a noun.
- #12,118
- frequency rank, English
- 5
- letters
- 7
- tracked misspellings
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - The red panda (Ailurus fulgens), a small raccoon-like animal of northeast Asia with reddish fur and a long, ringed tail.
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 | panda |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /ˈpændə/ |
| Letters | 5 |
| Frequency rank | #12,118 |
| Misspellings tracked | 7 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “panda” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for panda is 5 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /ˈpændə/. Corpus data places it at rank #12,118 in overall English word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it. Wiktionary records 3 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our generated misspelling index lists 7 likely wrong-spelling variants for panda, with forms such as "apnda", "padna", and "panad". Every one of these variants traces to a single-character edit -- an added or dropped letter, a swapped consonant, or a vowel swap -- the kind of slip a spell-checker is built to catch. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "PDA", "pond", "papa", and more, a pairing that trips writers up because the two words share enough sound or shape to blur together.
Etymologically, the entry records: Borrowed from French panda, of unclear ultimate origin but probably from the second element of nigálya-pónya, a local name for the red panda recorded in Nepal and Sikkim by Brian Houghton Hodgson (1800 or 1801 – 1894), an ethnologist, naturalist and the Bri… The correct English form is panda, spelled P-A-N-D-A.
Definition
- 1The red panda (Ailurus fulgens), a small raccoon-like animal of northeast Asia with reddish fur and a long, ringed tail.
- 2Ellipsis of giant panda (“Ailuropoda melanoleuca”).
- 3Ellipsis of panda car (“a black-and-white police car”).
Etymology
Borrowed from French panda, of unclear ultimate origin but probably from the second element of nigálya-pónya, a local name for the red panda recorded in Nepal and Sikkim by Brian Houghton Hodgson (1800 or 1801 – 1894), an ethnologist, naturalist and the British Resident of Nepal, possibly from Nepali निँगाले (nĩgāle, “relating to a certain species of bamboo”) (the adjectival form of निँगालो (nĩgālo), a variant of निङालो (niṅālo, “Drepanostachyum intermedium, a species of bamboo”)) + a regional Tibetan name for the animal (compare regional Tibetan ཕོ་ཉ (pho nya, “messenger”)). Attributive uses of sense 2 (“a giant panda”) generally refer to that animal’s distinctive black and white coat colour.
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: apnda,padna,panad,pandda,pannda,pnada,ppanda
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of panda - expressed in single-character edits (insert, delete, or swap one letter). Bigger bars stand out at a glance; a one-edit slip is the hardest to catch.
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 “panda”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is P-A-N-D-A - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /ˈpændə/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “PDA” - see the side-by-side comparison. panda vs PDA
- 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.