phonograph
/ˈfoʊnəˌɡɹæf/noun, verb
phonograph is spelled P-H-O-N-O-G-R-A-P-H. The wrong spelling people search most is phongraph: about 20 Bing searches a month in the United States (September 2025 to August 2026), about 1 in 147 of all searches for the word. Phonograph is a noun meaning “A device that captures sound waves onto an engraved archive; a lathe”. The plural of phonograph is phonographs.
How many letters and syllables are in phonograph?
| Letters | 10: P-H-O-N-O-G-R-A-P-H |
|---|---|
| Syllables | 3 (from its American pronunciation) |
| In writing | about once in every 2 million words; the 39,832nd most frequent word form |
| Wrong spellings searched | 1; the most searched, phongraph, about 20 Bing searches a month (all of them) |
Sources: letters and syllables from the English Wiktionary's hyphenation or pronunciation and the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary; written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media); Bing searches in the United States: the average month from September 2025 to August 2026 (Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, read September 30, 2026).
How do you spell phonograph?
Phonograph is spelled P-H-O-N-O-G-R-A-P-H. One wrong spelling is searched or written often enough to measure; together they are about 1 in 148 of the searches for phonograph in either form.
Bing searches in the United States: the average month from September 2025 to August 2026 (Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, read September 30, 2026). Wrong spellings are taken from Wiktionary entries tagged "misspelling" and its obsolete or nonstandard forms, Wikipedia's Lists of common misspellings and the codespell dictionary, then measured. The proofreader's marks show the change that corrects each one.
How common is phonograph?
Phonograph appears about once in every 2 million words in written English, the 39,832nd 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).
How do you pronounce phonograph?
- UK /ˈfəʊnəˌɡɹɑːf/
- US /ˈfoʊnəˌɡɹæf/
Phonograph has 3 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-phonograph.wav, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Forms of phonograph
- phonographs plural, present, singular, he/she/it
- phonographing participle, present
- phonographed participle, past
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
What does phonograph mean?
The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).
noun
- 1
A device that captures sound waves onto an engraved archive; a lathe.
- 2
UKA device that records or plays sound from cylinder records.
- 3
CanadaUSA record player.
- 4
datedA character or symbol used to represent a sound, especially one used in phonography.
verb
- 1
datedTo record for playback by phonograph.
- 2
datedTo transcribe into phonographic symbols.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How do you abbreviate phonograph?
Wiktionary records one abbreviation of phonograph: phono.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Phonograph in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
In the sense device that records or plays sound from cylinder records:
| Language | Words |
|---|---|
| German | Phonograph |
| Portuguese | fonógrafo |
| Spanish | fonógrafo |
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 phonograph come from?
From phono- + -graph.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).