Skip to main content
PlainSpell

relieve

/ɹɪˈliːv/verb

relieve is spelled R-E-L-I-E-V-E. The wrong spelling people search most is releive: about 130 Bing searches a month in the United States (September 2025 to August 2026), about 1 in 13 of all searches for the word. Relieve is a verb meaning “To ease (a person, person's thoughts etc.) from mental distress; to stop (someone) feeling anxious or…”.

How many letters and syllables are in relieve?

Letters7: R-E-L-I-E-V-E
Syllables2 (from its American pronunciation)
In writing5.9 times per million words; the 10,028th most frequent word form
Wrong spellings searched1; the most searched, releive, about 130 Bing searches a month (all of them)

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); Bing searches in the United States: the average month from September 2025 to August 2026 (Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, read September 30, 2026).

How do you spell relieve?

Relieve is spelled R-E-L-I-E-V-E. One wrong spelling is searched or written often enough to measure; together they are about 1 in 13 of the searches for relieve in either form.

relievethe right spelling1,570 searches a month
releivei and e swapped130 searches a month

Bing searches in the United States: the average month from September 2025 to August 2026 (Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, read September 30, 2026). Wrong spellings are taken from Wiktionary entries tagged "misspelling" and its obsolete or nonstandard forms, Wikipedia's Lists of common misspellings and the codespell dictionary, then measured. The proofreader's marks show the change that corrects each one.

How common is relieve?

Relieve appears 5.9 times per million words in written English, the 10,028th 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 relieve?

  • /ɹɪˈliːv/

Relieve has 2 syllables (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: En-us-relieve.ogg, LL-Q1860_(eng)-Vealhurl-relieve.wav, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).

Forms of relieve

  • relieves present, singular, he/she/it
  • relieving participle, present
  • relieved participle, past

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

What does relieve mean?

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

verb

  1. 1

    To ease (a person, person's thoughts etc.) from mental distress; to stop (someone) feeling anxious or worried, to alleviate the distress of.

    I was greatly relieved by the jury's verdict.

  2. 2

    To ease (someone, a part of the body etc.) or give relief from physical pain or discomfort.

  3. 3

    To alleviate (pain, distress, mental discomfort etc.).

  4. 4

    To provide comfort or assistance to (someone in need, especially in poverty).

  5. 5

    obsoleteTo lift up; to raise again.

  6. 6

    archaicTo raise (someone) out of danger or from (a specified difficulty etc.).

  7. 7

    To free (someone) from debt or legal obligations; to give legal relief to.

    This shall not relieve either Party of any obligations.

  8. 8

    To bring military help to (a besieged town); to lift the siege on.

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

Relieve in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese

LanguageWords
Frenchsoulager (to ease from mental distress), relayer (military: to free someone from their post), faire ses besoins, se soulager (euphemistically: to urinate or defecate)
Germanerleichtern (to ease from mental distress), ablösen (military: to free someone from their post), seine Notdurft verrichten (euphemistically: to urinate or defecate), lindern (to alleviate pain, distress, mental discomfort…), entlasten (to provide comfort or assistance to someone in…)
Portuguesealiviar (to ease from mental distress), aliviar-se (euphemistically: to urinate or defecate)
Spanishaliviar, aleviar (to ease from mental distress), relevar (law: to give legal relief)

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 relieve come from?

From Late Middle English releven, from Old French relever, specifically from the conjugated forms such as (jeo) relieve (“I lift up”), and its source, Latin relevo (“to lift up, lighten, relieve, alleviate”), combined form of re- (“back”) + levo (“to lift”). Doublet of relevate. Compare levant, levity, etc.

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

What to look up after relieve