pertussis
/pəˈtʌsɪs/
"pertussis" is a 9-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“pertussis” is uncommon English (frequency #50,147 among 4,417 “P” headwords), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- #50,147
- frequency rank, English
- 4,417
- “P” headwords
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Whooping cough.
Corpus desk
Index EN-pertussis · pertussis · English
pertussis · rank #50,147 · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-RARE #50,147
- LEN-LONG 9 letters
- VOW-3 3 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-MID 4,417
- PHOTO-FINISH peds
Nearest frequency peer: peds (-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 “pertussis”
Sparse band: bars invert rank so rarer forms read shorter
- Pecos
Pecos
49,856 corpus weight
- peds
peds
49,855 corpus weight
- pertussis
pertussis
49,854 corpus weight
- pettiness
pettiness
49,853 corpus weight
- peyote
peyote
49,852 corpus weight
- pff
pff
49,851 corpus weight
What this shows Long-tail view: where “pertussis” sits against similarly uncommon English ranks.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | pertussis |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /pəˈtʌsɪs/ |
| Letters | 9 |
| Frequency rank | #50,147 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “pertussis” in English
Rare enough to double-check
pertussis is uncommon English at frequency #50,147 among 4,417 “P” headwords, classed as anoun, transcribed /pəˈtʌsɪs/. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "Whooping cough.".
No generated misspelling entries exist for pertussis in our index, a sign its spelling follows regular English conventions. No close-neighbour confusable shows up for this headword in our dataset, since nothing in our dataset looks or sounds close enough to cause mix-ups.
Etymologically, the entry records: From New Latin, from Latin per- (“thorough”) + tussis (“cough”). The correct English form is pertussis, spelled P-E-R-T-U-S-S-I-S.
Definition
- 1Whooping cough.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how pertussis appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
With the introduction of an improved and standardized pertussis vaccine in the 1940s, there followed a remarkable decline in pertussis in the United States, most of the Western world, and Australia, New Zealand, and Japan.
Bordetella pertussis is a Gram-negative bacterial pathogen that infects the human respiratory tract, causing the disease pertussis or whooping cough.
Etymology
From New Latin, from Latin per- (“thorough”) + tussis (“cough”).
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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Similar English words by spelling shape
Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "pertussis", not the corpus desk frequency band.
Same letter count
Frequency-ranked English headwords with 9 letters (nearest by frequency rank).