plug
/plʌɡ/
"plug" is a 4-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“plug” is a regularly-used English word, ranked #5,726 in English word frequency and used as a noun.
- #5,726
- frequency rank, English
- 4
- letters
- 6
- tracked misspellings
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - A pronged connecting device which fits into a mating socket, especially an electrical one.
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 | plug |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /plʌɡ/ |
| Letters | 4 |
| Frequency rank | #5,726 |
| Misspellings tracked | 6 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “plug” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for plug is 4 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /plʌɡ/. Corpus data places it at rank #5,726 in overall English word frequency, indicating it appears regularly in written and spoken text. Wiktionary records 20 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our generated misspelling index lists 6 likely wrong-spelling variants for plug, with forms such as "lpug", "plgu", and "pllug". Each variant is a distinct typo pattern an edit-distance generator flags, typically a doubled-consonant error, a silent-letter drop, or a vowel substitution. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "PU", "put", "pub", and more, since the words sound or look close enough that writers reach for the wrong one mid-sentence.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Dutch plug, from Middle Dutch plugge (“peg, plug”), from Old Dutch *pluggi, from Proto-West Germanic *plugi. Further origin unknown. Possibly from Proto-Germanic *plugjaz, but the word seems originally restricted to northern continental West Germanic. … The correct English form is plug, spelled P-L-U-G.
Definition
- 1A pronged connecting device which fits into a mating socket, especially an electrical one.
- 2A pronged connecting device which fits into a mating socket, especially an electrical one.
- 3Any piece of wood, metal, or other substance used to stop or fill a hole.
- 4A flat oblong cake of pressed tobacco.
- 5A high, tapering silk hat.
- 6A worthless horse.
- 7Any worn-out or useless article.
- 8A book that fails to sell.
- 9A block of wood let into a wall to afford a hold for nails.
- 10A promotion (act of promoting) of a product (such as a book, film or play) or other thing, concept, etc, for example during an interview or a commercial.
- 11A body of once molten rock that hardened in a volcanic vent. Usually round or oval in shape.
- 12A type of lure consisting of a rigid, buoyant or semi-buoyant body and one or more hooks.
- 13A small seedling grown in a tray from expanded polystyrene or polythene filled usually with a peat or compost substrate.
- 14A growth of protoplasm that closes the pore openings in the cells of certain algae.
- 15A short cylindrical piece of jewellery commonly worn in larger-gauge body piercings, especially in the ear.
- 16A drug dealer.
- 17A branch from a water-pipe to supply a hose.
- 18A standard, modular fuselage component that can be added or removed.
- 19Ellipsis of spark plug.
- 20Ellipsis of fireplug (“fire hydrant”).
Etymology
From Dutch plug, from Middle Dutch plugge (“peg, plug”), from Old Dutch *pluggi, from Proto-West Germanic *plugi. Further origin unknown. Possibly from Proto-Germanic *plugjaz, but the word seems originally restricted to northern continental West Germanic. Perhaps ultimately from the same source as Dutch plag (“cut-out sod”), itself considered to be from a substrate. Compare German Low German Plüg, Norwegian plug (“peg, wedge”, probably borrowed from Middle Low German), German Pflock (“peg”, restricted to Central German and phonetically divergent). Possibly akin to Lithuanian plúkti (“to strike, hew”).
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: lpug,plgu,pllug,plugg,pplug,pulg
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of plug - 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 “plug”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is P-L-U-G - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /plʌɡ/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “PU” - see the side-by-side comparison. plug vs PU
- 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.