polished
/ˈpɑlɪʃt/
"polished" is a 8-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“polished” is a moderately-common English word, ranked #10,256 in English word frequency and used as an adjective.
- #10,256
- frequency rank, English
- 8
- letters
- 12
- tracked misspellings
- 5
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - Made smooth or shiny by polishing.
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 | polished |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Adjective |
| IPA | /ˈpɑlɪʃt/ |
| Letters | 8 |
| Frequency rank | #10,256 |
| Misspellings tracked | 12 |
| Confusable pairs | 5 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “polished” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for polished is 8 letters long, classified as an adjective, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /ˈpɑlɪʃt/. Corpus data places it at rank #10,256 in overall English word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it. Wiktionary records 2 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our generated misspelling index lists 12 likely wrong-spelling variants for polished, with forms such as "oplished", "ploished", and "poilshed". 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 5 confusable-pair relationships, "punished", "published", "Polish", and more, since the words sound or look close enough that writers reach for the wrong one mid-sentence.
This entry's etymology isn't recorded, so its spelling is easiest to reason about phoneme by phoneme, absent a documented history. The correct English form is polished, spelled P-O-L-I-S-H-E-D.
Definition
- 1Made smooth or shiny by polishing.
- 2Refined, elegant.
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: oplished,ploished,poilshed,polihsed,polisehd,polishde,polishedd,polishhed,polisshed,pollished,polsihed,ppolished
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of polished - 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 “polished”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is P-O-L-I-S-H-E-D - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /ˈpɑlɪʃt/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “punished” - see the side-by-side comparison. polished vs punished
- 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.