refereed

/ˌɹɛfəˈɹiːd/

//ˌɹɛfəˈɹiːd// verb

By · According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA) ·

"refereed" is a 8-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.

The verdict

“refereed” is uncommon English (frequency #51,352 among 3,094 “R” headwords), classed as a verb. The kind of spelling people second-guess.

#51,352
frequency rank, English
3,094
“R” headwords

According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - simple past and past participle of referee

Corpus desk

Index EN-refereed · refereed · English

refereed · rank #51,352 · 0 variants · 0 confusables

  • FREQ-RARE #51,352
  • LEN-LONG 8 letters
  • VOW-4 4 vowels
  • CONFUS-0 No pairs
  • VAR-0 0 variants
  • BOOK-MID 3,094
  • PHOTO-FINISH Redgrave

Nearest frequency peer: Redgrave (-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 “refereed”

Sparse band: bars invert rank so rarer forms read shorter

corpus weight

What this shows Long-tail view: where “refereed” sits against similarly uncommon English ranks.

Source FrequencyWords open word-frequency list As of September 3, 2026
Key facts for refereed
PropertyValue
Headwordrefereed
LanguageEnglish
Part of speechVerb
IPA/ˌɹɛfəˈɹiːd/
Letters8
Frequency rank#51,352
Misspellings tracked0
Confusable pairs0
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Long-tail rank of “refereed” in English

This scale runs from the tiny cluster of words that carry ordinary speech (left) to the long tail of words almost nobody reaches for (right).refereedfalls in this rarity band:

#1#100#1K#10K#100K
← used constantlyrarely used →

Scale is logarithmic (each tick is 10× rarer). Rare peers in the same band: “Redgrave” (#51,351), “rebus” (#51,350), “Reims” (#51,355). Among 3,094 “R” headwords, “refereed” is #51,352. Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list.

Rare enough to double-check

refereed is uncommon English at frequency #51,352 among 3,094 “R” headwords, classed as averb, transcribed /ˌɹɛfəˈɹiːd/. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "simple past and past participle of referee".

Our edit-distance generator produced no likely misspellings for refereed, since its letter sequence doesn't invite the usual edit-distance slips. Our confusable-pair dataset has no match for it, since nothing in our dataset looks or sounds close enough to cause mix-ups.

No borrowing history is documented for this entry, so spelling patterns must be inferred from the word's phoneme-to-grapheme mapping rather than from a documented borrowing chain. The correct English form is refereed, spelled R-E-F-E-R-E-E-D.

Definition

  1. 1
    simple past and past participle of referee

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 "refereed"?
"refereed" is spelled R-E-F-E-R-E-E-D. The IPA pronunciation is /ˌɹɛfəˈɹiːd/.
What does "refereed" mean?
As a verb, "refereed" means: simple past and past participle of referee
How do you pronounce "refereed"?
The IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) transcription for "refereed" is /ˌɹɛfəˈɹiːd/. Click the speaker icon on the pronunciation badge above to hear it spoken aloud where audio is available.
What language does "refereed" come from?
"refereed" is a English word. You can look up definitions, pronunciations, and spelling data for this and other words across English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and German on PlainSpell.
Is PlainSpell free to use?
Yes, PlainSpell is a completely free word reference. You can look up definitions, pronunciations, confusable pairs, homophones, and spelling corrections across 5 languages without any sign-up or subscription.

Similar English words by spelling shape

Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "refereed", not the corpus desk frequency band.

Same letter count

Frequency-ranked English headwords with 8 letters (nearest by frequency rank).

Redgrave#51,351smallish#51,400snobbery#51,403Sorenson#51,404

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list