payed
"payed" is a 5-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“payed” is a moderately-common English word, ranked #30,911 in English word frequency and used as a verb.
- #30,911
- frequency rank, English
- 5
- letters
- 7
- tracked misspellings
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - Obsolete spelling of paid.
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 | payed |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Verb |
| Letters | 5 |
| Frequency rank | #30,911 |
| Misspellings tracked | 7 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “payed” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for payed is 5 letters long, classified as a verb. Corpus data places it at rank #30,911 in overall English word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it. Wiktionary records 2 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 payed, with forms such as "apyed", "paeyd", and "payde". 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, "ped", "pye", "pays", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Etymologically, the entry records: See the etymology of the corresponding lemma form. The correct English form is payed, spelled P-A-Y-E-D.
Definition
- 1Obsolete spelling of paid.
- 2Misspelling of paid.
Etymology
See the etymology of the corresponding lemma form.
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: apyed,paeyd,payde,payedd,payyed,ppayed,pyaed
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of payed - measured in single-character edits (insert, delete, or substitute a letter). Larger bars are easier to catch; one-edit slips are the sneakiest.
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 “payed”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is P-A-Y-E-D - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Don't mix it up with “ped” - see the side-by-side comparison. payed vs ped
- 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.