rear
/ɹɪɹ/
"rear" is a 4-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“rear” is a regularly-used English word, ranked #3,449 in English word frequency and used as a verb.
- #3,449
- frequency rank, English
- 4
- letters
- 4
- tracked misspellings
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - To bring up to maturity, as offspring; to educate; to instruct; to foster.
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 | rear |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Verb |
| IPA | /ɹɪɹ/ |
| Letters | 4 |
| Frequency rank | #3,449 |
| Misspellings tracked | 4 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “rear” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for rear is 4 letters long, classified as a verb, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /ɹɪɹ/. Corpus data places it at rank #3,449 in overall English word frequency, indicating it appears regularly in written and spoken text. Wiktionary records 10 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our generated misspelling index lists 4 likely wrong-spelling variants for rear, with forms such as "erar", "rearr", and "rera". Every one of these variants traces to a single-character edit -- an added or dropped letter, a swapped consonant, or a vowel swap -- the kind of slip a spell-checker is built to catch. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "RR", "red", "rep", and more, since the words sound or look close enough that writers reach for the wrong one mid-sentence.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English reren (“to raise”), from Old English rǣran (“to raise, set upright, promote, exalt, begin, create, give rise to, excite, rouse, arouse, stir up”), from Proto-West Germanic *raiʀijan, from Proto-Germanic *raizijaną, *raisijaną (“to cause … The correct English form is rear, spelled R-E-A-R.
Definition
- 1To bring up to maturity, as offspring; to educate; to instruct; to foster.
- 2To breed and raise.
- 3To rise up on the hind legs.
- 4To get angry.
- 5To rise high above, tower above.
- 6To raise physically or metaphorically; to lift up; to cause to rise, to elevate.
- 7To construct by building; to set up
- 8To raise spiritually; to lift up; to elevate morally.
- 9To lift and take up.
- 10To rouse; to strip up.
Etymology
From Middle English reren (“to raise”), from Old English rǣran (“to raise, set upright, promote, exalt, begin, create, give rise to, excite, rouse, arouse, stir up”), from Proto-West Germanic *raiʀijan, from Proto-Germanic *raizijaną, *raisijaną (“to cause to rise, raise”), from Proto-Indo-European *h₁rey- (“to lift oneself, rise”). Cognate with Scots rere (“to construct, build, rear”), Icelandic reisa (“to raise”), Gothic 𐍂𐌰𐌹𐍃𐌾𐌰𐌽 (raisjan, “to cause to rise, lift up, establish”), German reisen (“to travel”, literally “to rear up and depart”); and a doublet of raise. More at rise. Related to rise and raise, which is used for several of its now archaic or obsolete senses and for some of its senses that are currently more common in other dialects of English.
Synonyms
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: erar,rearr,rera,rrear
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of rear - 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
How do you spell "rear"?
What does "rear" mean?
What words are commonly confused with "rear"?
How do you pronounce "rear"?
What is the origin of the word "rear"?
Is PlainSpell free to use?
Using “rear”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is R-E-A-R - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /ɹɪɹ/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “RR” - see the side-by-side comparison. rear vs RR
- 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.