r
/ɑː(ɹ)/
"r" is a 1-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“r” is in the everyday core of English, ranked #449 in English word frequency and used as a character.
- #449
- frequency rank, English
- 1
- letter
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - The eighteenth letter of the English alphabet, called ar and written in the Latin script.
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 | r |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Character |
| IPA | /ɑː(ɹ)/ |
| Letters | 1 |
| Frequency rank | #449 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “r” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for r is 1 letters long, classified as a character, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /ɑː(ɹ)/. Corpus data places it at rank #449 in overall English word frequency, putting it firmly in the everyday core of the language. The dominant gloss from Wiktionary reads: "The eighteenth letter of the English alphabet, called ar and written in the Latin script.".
The misspelling generator found no plausible variants for r, which points to an orthography that plays by predictable English rules. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "re", "RS", "rd", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Etymologically, the entry records: Old English lower case letter r, from 7th century replacement by Latin lower case r of the Anglo-Saxon Futhorc letter ᚱ. The correct English form is r, spelled R.
Definition
- 1The eighteenth letter of the English alphabet, called ar and written in the Latin script.
Etymology
Old English lower case letter r, from 7th century replacement by Latin lower case r of the Anglo-Saxon Futhorc letter ᚱ.
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 “r”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is R - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /ɑː(ɹ)/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “re” - see the side-by-side comparison. r vs re
- 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.