recto
/ˈɹɛk.toʊ/
"recto" is a 5-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“recto” is uncommon English (frequency #71,838 among 3,094 “R” headwords), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- #71,838
- frequency rank, English
- 3,094
- “R” headwords
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - The front side of a flat object which is to be examined visually, as for reading, such as a sheet, leaf, coin or medal.
Corpus desk
Index EN-recto · recto · English
recto · rank #71,838 · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-RARE #71,838
- LEN-MID 5 letters
- VOW-2 2 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-MID 3,094
- PHOTO-FINISH recirculation
Nearest frequency peer: recirculation (-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 “recto”
Sparse band: bars invert rank so rarer forms read shorter
- readjustment
readjustment
28,167 corpus weight
- recirculati…
recirculation
28,164 corpus weight
- recto
recto
28,163 corpus weight
- Redhill
Redhill
28,162 corpus weight
- reheating
reheating
28,161 corpus weight
- rehire
rehire
28,160 corpus weight
What this shows Long-tail view: where “recto” sits against similarly uncommon English ranks.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | recto |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /ˈɹɛk.toʊ/ |
| Letters | 5 |
| Frequency rank | #71,838 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “recto” in English
Rare enough to double-check
recto is uncommon English at frequency #71,838 among 3,094 “R” headwords, classed as anoun, transcribed /ˈɹɛk.toʊ/. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 3 senses are on record.
No misspelling variants are generated for recto in our index, a sign its spelling follows regular English conventions. Our confusable-pair dataset has no match for it, a sign it's visually distinctive enough not to be mixed up with another word.
Etymologically, the entry records: Borrowed from Latin rēctō foliō (“on the right leaf, on the right page”), the ablative case of the Latin rēctus (“right”). Compare versus (“turned”). The correct English form is recto, spelled R-E-C-T-O.
Definition
- 1The front side of a flat object which is to be examined visually, as for reading, such as a sheet, leaf, coin or medal.
- 2The front side of a flat object which is to be examined visually, as for reading, such as a sheet, leaf, coin or medal.
- 3A writ of right.
Etymology
Borrowed from Latin rēctō foliō (“on the right leaf, on the right page”), the ablative case of the Latin rēctus (“right”). Compare versus (“turned”).
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 "recto", not the corpus desk frequency band.
Same letter count
Frequency-ranked English headwords with 5 letters (nearest by frequency rank).