rancorous
/ˈɹæŋ.kəɹ.əs/
"rancorous" is a 9-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“rancorous” is uncommon English (outside the top frequency list), classed as an adjective. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency English
- 9
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Full of rancor; bitter; unforgiving.
Corpus desk
Index EN-rancorous · rancorous · English
rancorous · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
- LEN-LONG 9 letters
- VOW-4 4 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-THIN "R" thin
- PHOTO-UNK Peer pending
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.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | rancorous |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Adjective |
| IPA | /ˈɹæŋ.kəɹ.əs/ |
| Letters | 9 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “rancorous” in English
Rare enough to double-check
rancorous is uncommon English outside the top frequency list, classed as anadjective, transcribed /ˈɹæŋ.kəɹ.əs/. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "Full of rancor; bitter; unforgiving.".
We couldn't generate a plausible misspelling set for rancorous, since its letter pattern doesn't lend itself to common typo substitutions. Our dataset records no confusable match here, which tends to mean the word is visually distinctive enough to stand on its own.
Etymologically, the entry records: From rancor + -ous. The correct English form is rancorous, spelled R-A-N-C-O-R-O-U-S.
Definition
- 1Full of rancor; bitter; unforgiving.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how rancorous appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
rancorous speech
Despite its attempt to provide what it saw as sober current-affairs programming in a sea of often-rancorous cable news channels, and winning some top awards in journalism, Al Jazeera America was unable to build an audience—it reached about 60 million households, compared to 100 million for other cable broadcasters—or draw advertisers.
Etymology
From rancor + -ous.
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). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.