perk up
"perk-up" is a 6-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“perk up” is uncommon English (outside the top frequency list), classed as a verb. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency English
- 7
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - To become more upright
Corpus desk
Index EN-perk-up · perk up · English
perk up · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
- LEN-LONG 7 letters
- VOW-2 2 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 | perk up |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Verb |
| Letters | 7 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “perk up” in English
Rare enough to double-check
perk up is uncommon English outside the top frequency list, classed as averb. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 5 senses are on record.
No generated misspelling entries exist for perk up in our index, since its letter sequence doesn't invite the usual edit-distance slips. Our confusable-pair dataset has no match for it, which typically means the spelling is too distinctive to be mistaken for another word.
No borrowing history is documented for this entry, so spelling patterns must be inferred from the word's phoneme-to-grapheme mapping rather than from a documented borrowing chain. The correct English form is perk up, spelled P-E-R-K- -U-P.
Definition
- 1To become more upright
- 2To become more lively or enthusiastic.
- 3To cause to be more upright, straighten up.
- 4to cause to be more lively or enthusiastic.
- 5To exalt oneself, take on a higher status or position.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how perk up appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
His ears perked up when he heard there would be ice cream.
The Lion bowed down his head and whispered something to Puzzle [the donkey] at which his long ears went down; but then he said something else at which the ears perked up again.
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.