penicillium
"penicillium" is a 11-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“penicillium” is uncommon English (frequency #73,517 among 4,417 “P” headwords), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- #73,517
- frequency rank, English
- 4,417
- “P” headwords
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Any of the blue-green fungi, of the genus Penicillium, that are used in the manufacture of cheeses, and are an important source of antibiotics.
Corpus desk
Index EN-penicillium · penicillium · English
penicillium · rank #73,517 · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-RARE #73,517
- LEN-MEGA 11 letters
- VOW-5 5 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-MID 4,417
- PHOTO-FINISH penna
Nearest frequency peer: penna (+1 rank slots)
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.
Long-tail ranks near “penicillium”
Sparse band: bars invert rank so rarer forms read shorter
- paperboard
paperboard
26,487 corpus weight
- patristic
patristic
26,486 corpus weight
- penicillium
penicillium
26,484 corpus weight
- penna
penna
26,483 corpus weight
- personae
personae
26,482 corpus weight
- Petry
Petry
26,479 corpus weight
What this shows Long-tail view: where “penicillium” sits against similarly uncommon English ranks.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | penicillium |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| Letters | 11 |
| Frequency rank | #73,517 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “penicillium” in English
Rare enough to double-check
penicillium is uncommon English at frequency #73,517 among 4,417 “P” headwords, classed as anoun. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "Any of the blue-green fungi, of the genus Penicillium, that are used in the manufacture of cheeses, and are an important source of antibiotics.".
We couldn't generate a plausible misspelling set for penicillium, a sign its spelling follows regular English conventions. No confusable counterpart is on file for this word, since no other headword is close enough in sound or shape to pair with it.
Etymologically, the entry records: From the genus name. The correct English form is penicillium, spelled P-E-N-I-C-I-L-L-I-U-M.
Definition
- 1Any of the blue-green fungi, of the genus Penicillium, that are used in the manufacture of cheeses, and are an important source of antibiotics.
Etymology
From the genus name.
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.
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Similar English words by spelling shape
Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "penicillium", not the corpus desk frequency band.
Same letter count
Frequency-ranked English headwords with 11 letters (nearest by frequency rank).