-philous

suffix

"philous" is a 7-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.

The verdict

“-philous” is uncommon English (outside the top frequency list), classed as a suffix. The kind of spelling people second-guess.

Unranked
below top-frequency English
8
letters

According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - having an affinity, attraction, preference or love of something

Key facts for -philous
PropertyValue
Headword-philous
LanguageEnglish
Part of speechSuffix
Letters8
Misspellings tracked0
Confusable pairs0
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Where “-philous” sits in English frequency

-philous falls outside the top-100,000 ranked English words, the long-tail zone of technical, archaic, or low-frequency vocabulary, exactly where readers second-guess spellings most.

Beyond rank #100,000. Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list.

Rare enough to double-check

-philous is uncommon English outside the top frequency list, classed as asuffix. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "having an affinity, attraction, preference or love of something".

No generated misspelling entries exist for -philous in our index, which points to an orthography that plays by predictable English rules. No close-neighbour confusable shows up for this headword in our dataset, since its spelling is unusual enough that it doesn't cluster with a lookalike.

Etymologically, the entry records: From Ancient Greek φίλος (phílos, “love”) + -ous. The correct English form is -philous, spelled --P-H-I-L-O-U-S.

Definition

  1. 1
    having an affinity, attraction, preference or love of something

Etymology

From Ancient Greek φίλος (phílos, “love”) + -ous.

This word in other languages

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.

Frequently Asked Questions

How do you spell "-philous"?
"-philous" is spelled --P-H-I-L-O-U-S.
What does "-philous" mean?
As a suffix, "-philous" means: having an affinity, attraction, preference or love of something
What is the origin of the word "-philous"?
From Ancient Greek φίλος (phílos, “love”) + -ous. See the full etymology section above for more details.
Is PlainSpell free to use?
Yes, PlainSpell is a completely free word reference. You can look up definitions, pronunciations, confusable pairs, homophones, and spelling corrections across 5 languages without any sign-up or subscription.

Using “-philous”

The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.

  • The one correct English spelling is --P-H-I-L-O-U-S - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
  • 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.

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list FrequencyWords open word-frequency list