paroxysmal
Definition, pronunciation, etymology, and usage for the English word. Free spelling reference powered by Wiktionary.
Detailed reference entry for the English word "paroxysmal", 10-letters, with pronunciation in International Phonetic Alphabet notation, etymology traced through Germanic and Romance roots where applicable, common misspelling variants catalogued from Wiktionary, and usage frequency ranked against an open word-frequency list covering the top 100,000 English words. PlainSpell covers English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and German spelling with confusable-pair detection that highlights visually and phonetically similar words. This entry for "paroxysmal" includes synonyms, antonyms, homophones, and cross-language translation pointers sourced from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org extract. Whether you are verifying the correct spelling of "paroxysmal" for academic writing, checking homophone confusion, or exploring etymological origins, this page provides a citation-backed, free reference that requires no sign-up.
The verdict
“paroxysmal” is an uncommon English word, ranked #91,905 in English word frequency and used as an adjective.
- #91,905
- frequency rank, English
- 10
- letters
Dominant Wiktionary sense: Of, pertaining to, causing or accompanied by paroxysms.
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See how paroxysmal compares against similar English words.
Browse all word comparisons →| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | paroxysmal |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Adjective |
| IPA | /pæɹ.əkˈsɪz.məl/ |
| Letters | 10 |
| Frequency rank | #91,905 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “paroxysmal” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for paroxysmal is 10 letters long, classified as an adjective, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /pæɹ.əkˈsɪz.məl/. Corpus data places it at rank #91,905 in overall English word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it. The dominant gloss from Wiktionary reads: "Of, pertaining to, causing or accompanied by paroxysms.".
No misspelling variants are generated for paroxysmal in our index, suggesting the orthography follows predictable English patterns. It is not paired with a close-neighbour confusable in our dataset, which tends to mean the word is visually distinctive enough to stand on its own.
Etymologically, the entry records: From paroxysm + -al. Root origin matters for spelling because borrowed morphemes (Greek, Latin, Old French, Old English) carry their source-language orthographic conventions into modern English, which is why historical etymology is often the cleanest predictor of whether a cluster like "-ough", "-eau", or "-tion" will appear. For readers arriving here from a spelling check, the authoritative guidance is: the correct English form is paroxysmal, spelled P-A-R-O-X-Y-S-M-A-L, and any other sequence of those letters, regardless of how natural it feels, is a misspelling in standard orthography.
Definition
- 1Of, pertaining to, causing or accompanied by paroxysms.
Etymology
From paroxysm + -al.
Frequency rank: #91,905 in English
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Using “paroxysmal”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is P-A-R-O-X-Y-S-M-A-L — every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /pæɹ.əkˈsɪz.məl/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Browse more English words and confusable pairs in the same reference. English words
Nearby English words
Other entries that begin with the letter P in our English index: