piss
/pɪs/
"piss" is a 4-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“piss” is a regularly-used English word, ranked #5,443 in English word frequency and used as a noun.
- #5,443
- frequency rank, English
- 4
- letters
- 4
- tracked misspellings
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - Urine.
Visual similarity to commonly confused words
How many letter changes separate each confused pair (Levenshtein distance, normalized).
Source: PlainSpell confusable corpus (Wiktionary, CC BY-SA).
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | piss |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /pɪs/ |
| Letters | 4 |
| Frequency rank | #5,443 |
| Misspellings tracked | 4 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “piss” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for piss is 4 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /pɪs/. Corpus data places it at rank #5,443 in overall English word frequency, indicating it appears regularly in written and spoken text. Wiktionary records 4 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our generated misspelling index lists 4 likely wrong-spelling variants for piss, with forms such as "ipss", "pis", and "ppiss". Each of these forms differs from the correct spelling by one small edit: a doubled letter, a dropped silent letter, or a substituted vowel. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "PS", "pit", "pos", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English pisse (noun) and pissen (verb), from Old French pissier, possibly from Vulgar Latin *pīssiāre, probably of imitative origin. Compare Old Norse pissa (“to urinate, piss”). Displaced Old English micge. The correct English form is piss, spelled P-I-S-S.
Definition
- 1Urine.
- 2The act of urinating.
- 3Alcoholic beverage, especially of inferior quality.
- 4An intensifier.
Etymology
From Middle English pisse (noun) and pissen (verb), from Old French pissier, possibly from Vulgar Latin *pīssiāre, probably of imitative origin. Compare Old Norse pissa (“to urinate, piss”). Displaced Old English micge.
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: ipss,pis,ppiss,psis
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of piss - counted as single-character edits (an insertion, a deletion, or a substituted letter). The larger the bar, the easier the typo is to spot; one-edit slips are the ones that sneak past readers.
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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Using “piss”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is P-I-S-S - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /pɪs/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “PS” - see the side-by-side comparison. piss vs PS
- 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.