passably
"passably" is a 8-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“passably” is uncommon English (outside the top frequency list), classed as an adverb. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency English
- 8
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - In a passable fashion; moderately; adequately.
Corpus desk
Index EN-passably · passably · English
passably · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
- LEN-LONG 8 letters
- VOW-3 3 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-THIN "P" thin
- PHOTO-UNK Peer pending
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.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | passably |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Adverb |
| Letters | 8 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “passably” in English
Rare enough to double-check
passably is uncommon English outside the top frequency list, classed as anadverb. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "In a passable fashion; moderately; adequately.".
Our edit-distance generator produced no likely misspellings for passably, suggesting the orthography follows predictable English patterns. This entry stands alone in our confusable dataset, which tends to mean the word is visually distinctive enough to stand on its own.
Etymologically, the entry records: From passable + -ly. The correct English form is passably, spelled P-A-S-S-A-B-L-Y.
Definition
- 1In a passable fashion; moderately; adequately.
Recorded use
Wiktionary exampleThese source excerpts show how passably appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
The night air was passably cool and he strolled through the town at a measured pace, killing time till bedtime.
Etymology
From passable + -ly.
Definitions, pronunciation, and etymology for this entry are drawn from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org structured extract (CC BY-SA). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.