poon
/puːn/
"poon" is a 4-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“poon” is a moderately-common English word, ranked #48,420 in English word frequency and used as a noun.
- #48,420
- frequency rank, English
- 4
- letters
- 4
- tracked misspellings
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - Any of several East Indian trees of the genus Calophyllum, yielding a light, hard wood used for masts, spars, etc.
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 | poon |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /puːn/ |
| Letters | 4 |
| Frequency rank | #48,420 |
| Misspellings tracked | 4 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “poon” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for poon is 4 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /puːn/. Corpus data places it at rank #48,420 in overall English word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it. The dominant gloss from Wiktionary reads: "Any of several East Indian trees of the genus Calophyllum, yielding a light, hard wood used for masts, spars, etc.".
Our generated misspelling index lists 4 likely wrong-spelling variants for poon, with forms such as "opon", "pono", and "poonn". 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, "pro", "pop", "pot", and more, since the words sound or look close enough that writers reach for the wrong one mid-sentence.
Etymologically, the entry records: Compare Tamil புன்னை (puṉṉai), Malayalam പുന്ന (punna), names for Calophyllum inophyllum. Doublet of punnai. The correct English form is poon, spelled P-O-O-N.
Definition
- 1Any of several East Indian trees of the genus Calophyllum, yielding a light, hard wood used for masts, spars, etc.
Etymology
Compare Tamil புன்னை (puṉṉai), Malayalam പുന്ന (punna), names for Calophyllum inophyllum. Doublet of punnai.
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: opon,pono,poonn,ppoon
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of poon - 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 “poon”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is P-O-O-N - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /puːn/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “pro” - see the side-by-side comparison. poon vs pro
- 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.