prise
/pɹaɪz/
"prise" is a 5-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“prise” is uncommon English (frequency #56,380 among 4,417 “P” headwords), classed as a verb. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- #56,380
- frequency rank, English
- 4,417
- “P” headwords
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - To force (open) with a lever; to pry.
Corpus desk
Index EN-prise · prise · English
prise · rank #56,380 · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-RARE #56,380
- LEN-MID 5 letters
- VOW-2 2 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-MID 4,417
- PHOTO-FINISH proline
Nearest frequency peer: proline (+1 rank slots)
Read with this headword: Spelling guide for this pattern
Desk codes from Wiktionary headword shape, FrequencyWords rank tier, confusable-pair count, generated misspelling depth, letter-cohort book size, and photo-finish peer. Not a difficulty grade.
Long-tail ranks near “prise”
Sparse band: bars invert rank so rarer forms read shorter
- Portillo
Portillo
43,624 corpus weight
- prater
prater
43,623 corpus weight
- prise
prise
43,621 corpus weight
- proline
proline
43,620 corpus weight
- protestor
protestor
43,618 corpus weight
- Purim
Purim
43,617 corpus weight
What this shows Long-tail view: where “prise” sits against similarly uncommon English ranks.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | prise |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Verb |
| IPA | /pɹaɪz/ |
| Letters | 5 |
| Frequency rank | #56,380 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “prise” in English
Rare enough to double-check
prise is uncommon English at frequency #56,380 among 4,417 “P” headwords, classed as averb, transcribed /pɹaɪz/. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 2 senses are on record.
Our edit-distance generator produced no likely misspellings for prise, a straightforward case of a spelling with little room for common typos. No close-neighbour confusable shows up for this headword in our dataset, since nothing in our dataset looks or sounds close enough to cause mix-ups.
Etymologically, the entry records: From the Middle English noun prise (“taking of something”), from Old French prise (“seizure; taking; capture”), past participle of prendre (“to take”). Doublet of prize. The correct English form is prise, spelled P-R-I-S-E.
Definition
- 1To force (open) with a lever; to pry.
- 2To extract something that is difficult to obtain.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how prise appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
I think he must have been trying to prise open that box yonder when he was attacked.
Come, force the gates with crowbars, prise them apart!
Etymology
From the Middle English noun prise (“taking of something”), from Old French prise (“seizure; taking; capture”), past participle of prendre (“to take”). Doublet of prize.
This word in other languages
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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Similar English words by spelling shape
Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "prise", not the corpus desk frequency band.
Same letter count
Frequency-ranked English headwords with 5 letters (nearest by frequency rank).