pectin
/ˈpɛktɪn/noun
pectin is a noun meaning “A plant-derived polysaccharide found in cell walls (especially in fruits) that forms a gel under acidic conditions and is commonly used to thicken…” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). It is spelled P-E-C-T-I-N and has 2 syllables, and it appears about once in every 4 million words in written English (wordfreq, 2021 data). The plural of pectin is pectins.
What does pectin mean?
noun
- 1
A plant-derived polysaccharide found in cell walls (especially in fruits) that forms a gel under acidic conditions and is commonly used to thicken foods like jam and jellies.
Apple is rich in pectin and so is often added to other fruits when making jam so it will set.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How do you pronounce pectin?
- /ˈpɛktɪn/
Pectin has 2 syllables (counted from its American pronunciation in the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary).
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: LL-Q1860_(eng)-Vealhurl-pectin.wav, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Forms of pectin
- pectins plural
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How common is pectin?
Pectin appears about once in every 4 million words in written English, the 58,063rd most frequent word form in the list.
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
Pectin in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
In the sense substance:
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Translations are Wiktionary's, by sense; a linked word has its own PlainSpell page.
Where does pectin come from?
From French pectine, coined in the 1830s by Henri Braconnot, from acide pectique "pectic acid", from Ancient Greek πηκτικός (pēktikós, “curdling”), from πηκτός (pēktós, “curdled”), from πήγνυμι (pḗgnumi, “stiffen”).
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).