please
/pliz/verb, adverb, interjection
please is spelled P-L-E-A-S-E. The wrong spelling people search most is plese: about 80 Bing searches a month in the United States (September 2025 to August 2026), about 1 in 196 of all searches for the word. Please is a verb meaning “To make happy or satisfy; to give pleasure to”.
How many letters and syllables are in please?
| Letters | 6: P-L-E-A-S-E |
|---|---|
| Syllables | 1 (from its American pronunciation) |
| In writing | 457 times per million words; the 207th most frequent word form |
| Wrong spellings searched | 2; the most searched, plese, about 80 Bing searches a month (all of them) |
| Rhymes with | |
| Same letters |
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); rhymes and same-letter words are computed by PlainSpell from its own word list.
How do you spell please?
Please is spelled P-L-E-A-S-E. 2 wrong spellings are searched or written often enough to measure; together they are about 1 in 112 of the searches for please 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 please?
Please appears 457 times per million words in written English, the 207th 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 please?
- UK /pliːz/
- US /pliz/
Please has one syllable (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: En-uk-please.ogg, En-us-please.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
What rhymes with please?
The 12 most written words on PlainSpell end in the same sounds as please from its last stressed vowel (/iz/):
Spelled with the same letters in another order: asleep, elapse, sapele.
Computed by PlainSpell from the pronunciations in the English Wiktionary (dump of September 2, 2026): a rhyme shares every sound from the last stressed vowel to the end; ordered by written frequency (wordfreq 3.1).
Forms of please
- pleases present, singular, he/she/it
- pleasing participle, present
- pleased participle, past, singular, he/she/it, plural
- pleace
- plaise
- pls
- puh-lease
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
What does please mean?
The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).
verb
- 1
To make happy or satisfy; to give pleasure to.
Her presentation pleased the executives.
- 2
To desire; to will; to be pleased by.
Just do as you please.
adverb
- 1
Used to make a polite request.
Please, pass the bread.
interjection
- 1
Used as an affirmative to an offer.
Near-synonym: thank you
- 2
An expression of annoyance, impatience, or exasperation.
Oh, please, do we have to hear that again?
- 3
An expression of annoyance, impatience, or exasperation.
Near-synonyms: enough, enough already, that's enough, no more, cut it out, knock it off, shut up, STFU
- 4
Said as a request to repeat information.
Customer while ordering: Can I get a [unintelligible]? Restaurant employee: Please?
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How do you abbreviate please?
Wiktionary records 2 abbreviations of please: pls, plz.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Please in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
| Language | Words |
|---|---|
| French | plaire , s'il vous plaît, s'il te plaît, S.V.P., prière de, veuillez |
| German | gefallen, rechtmachen , bitte , belieben , gerne |
| Portuguese | agradar, aprazer, prazer , por favor, faça favor, se faz favor |
| Spanish | gustarle, agradarle, placer, complacer, darle gusto , por favor |
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 please come from?
From Middle English plesen, plaisen, borrowed from Old French plaise, conjugated form of plaisir or plaire, from Latin placeō (“to please, to seem good”), from the Proto-Indo-European *pleHk- (“pleasingness, permission”). In this sense, displaced native Old English līcian, whence Modern English like.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).