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re

/ɹiː/preposition, noun

re is spelled R-E: 2 letters and one syllable. It appears 170 times per million words in written English, the 591st most frequent word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). As a preposition, re means “About, regarding, with reference to; used especially in letters, documents, emails and case law” (English Wiktionary, September 2026).

How many letters and syllables are in re?

Letters2: R-E
Syllables1 (from its American pronunciation)
In writing170 times per million words; the 591st most frequent word form
Wrong spellings searchednone measured in search
Rhymes with

Sources: letters and syllables from the English Wiktionary's hyphenation or pronunciation and the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary; written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media); rhymes and same-letter words are computed by PlainSpell from its own word list.

How common is re?

Re appears 170 times per million words in written English, the 591st most frequent word form in the list.

Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).

How do you pronounce re?

  • /ɹiː/
  • /ɹeɪ/

As a noun (“A syllable used in solfège to represent the second note of…”): /ɹeɪ/.

As a noun (“Clipping of rematch”): /ɹiː/, /ɹiː/.

Re has one syllable (counted from its American pronunciation in the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary).

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: LL-Q1860_(eng)-Vealhurl-re_(e).wav, LL-Q1860_(eng)-Vealhurl-re_(note).wav, LL-Q1860_(eng)-Persent101-re-_(1).wav, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).

Words people confuse with re

Also written: ray.

Sources: English Wiktionary (homophones, alternative spellings).

What rhymes with re?

The 12 most written words on PlainSpell end in the same sounds as re from its last stressed vowel (/i/):

Computed by PlainSpell from the pronunciations in the English Wiktionary (dump of September 2, 2026): a rhyme shares every sound from the last stressed vowel to the end; ordered by written frequency (wordfreq 3.1).

Forms of re

  • ray
  • res plural

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

What does re mean?

The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).

preposition

  1. 1

    About, regarding, with reference to; used especially in letters, documents, emails and case law.

    Re A (conjoined twins) [2000] EWCA Civ 254

noun

  1. 1

    A syllable used in solfège to represent the second note of a major scale.

  2. 2

    slangClipping of rematch.

    gg, no re'

  3. 3

    Clipping of reinsurance, used in the branding of reinsurance company names.

  4. 4

    informalClipping of age regressor.

noun

as øre
  1. 1

    A currency unit worth one hundredth of a Norwegian and Danish krone.

symbol

as Re
  1. 1

    rupee

preposition

as RE
  1. 1

    Alternative form of re (“regarding”).

symbol

as RE
  1. 1

    Earth radius: the radius of planet Earth, regarded as a unit of measurement.

  2. 2

    The radius of the Earth specifically.

noun

as RE
  1. 1

    Initialism of recursively enumerable; the class of decision problems for which a “yes” answer can be verified by a Turing machine in a finite amount of time. See more at RE (complexity) on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

  2. 2

    Initialism of religious education.

  3. 3

    Initialism of rare earth.

  4. 4

    Initialism of response element.

  5. 5

    Initialism of real estate.

  6. 6

    Initialism of renewable energy.

  7. 7

    Initialism of run-time environment.

  8. 8

    Initialism of reverse engineering.

Usage

Wiktionary also records re as a common misspelling of another word in some uses; the senses above are its own.

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

Re in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese

LanguageWords
GermanAW (regarding), re-, wieder-, zurück- (again)
Spanishcon relación a, con respecto a, asunto (regarding), re- (again)
Frenchr-, re-, ré- (again), ré (the second note in solfège)
Portuguesere- (again), ré (the second note in solfège)

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Translations are Wiktionary's, by sense; a linked word has its own PlainSpell page.

Where does re come from?

Borrowed from Latin rē, ablative of rēs (“thing, matter, topic”).

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

What to look up after re