retire
Definition, pronunciation, etymology, and usage for the English word. Free spelling reference powered by Wiktionary.
Letters
6 characters
Language
English
word origin
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Detailed reference entry for the English word "retire", 6-letters, with pronunciation in International Phonetic Alphabet notation, etymology traced through Germanic and Romance roots where applicable, common misspelling variants catalogued from Hunspell error dictionaries, and usage frequency ranked against the top 100,000 English words in the Wordfreq corpus. PlainSpell covers English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and German spelling with confusable-pair detection that highlights visually and phonetically similar words. This entry for "retire" includes synonyms, antonyms, homophones, and cross-language translation pointers sourced from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org extract. Whether you are verifying the correct spelling of "retire" for academic writing, checking homophone confusion, or exploring etymological origins, this page provides a citation-backed, free reference that requires no sign-up.
retire is aEnglishverb. It means: To stop working on a permanent basis, usually because of old age or illness. Pronounced /ɹəˈtaɪə(ɹ)/. It ranks #6,613 in English word frequency. Often confused with retro and retry.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | retire |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Verb |
| IPA | /ɹəˈtaɪə(ɹ)/ |
| Letters | 6 |
| Frequency rank | #6,613 |
| Misspellings tracked | 8 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Frequency rank visualization
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for retire is 6 letters long, classified as averb, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /ɹəˈtaɪə(ɹ)/. Corpus data places it at rank #6,613 in overall English word frequency, indicating it appears regularly in written and spoken text.Wiktionary records 12 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our Hunspell-derived misspelling index lists 8 documented wrong-spelling variants for retire, with forms such as "ertire", "reitre", and "retier". Each variant represents a distinct typo pattern that appears often enough in corpora to be worth flagging, typically a doubled-consonant error, a silent-letter drop, or a vowel substitution.It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "retro", "retry", "return", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle French retirer (“draw back”), from Old French retirer, built from re- (“back”) + tirer (“draw, pull”), the latter from Vulgar Latin *tīrāre, of highly uncertain origin. Root origin matters for spelling because borrowed morphemes (Greek, Latin, Old French, Old English) carry their source-language orthographic conventions into modern English, which is why historical etymology is often the cleanest predictor of whether a cluster like "-ough", "-eau", or "-tion" will appear. For readers arriving here from a spelling check, the authoritative guidance is: the correct English form is retire, spelled R-E-T-I-R-E, and any other sequence of those letters, regardless of how natural it feels, is a misspelling in standard orthography.
Definition
- 1To stop working on a permanent basis, usually because of old age or illness.
- 2To stop playing their sport and in competitions a sports player.
- 3To withdraw; to take away.
- 4To cease use or production of something.
- 5To withdraw from circulation, or from the market; to take up and pay.
- 6To cause to retire; specifically, to designate as no longer qualified for active service; to place on the retired list.
- 7To voluntarily stop batting before being dismissed so that the next batsman can bat.
- 8To make a play which results in a runner or the batter being out, either by means of a put out, fly out or strikeout. Also, when such an event ends a team's turn at bat.
- 9To go back or return; to withdraw or retreat, especially from public view; to go into privacy.
- 10To retreat from action or danger; to withdraw for safety or pleasure.
- 11To recede; to fall or bend back.
- 12To go to bed.
Etymology
From Middle French retirer (“draw back”), from Old French retirer, built from re- (“back”) + tirer (“draw, pull”), the latter from Vulgar Latin *tīrāre, of highly uncertain origin.
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: ertire,reitre,retier,retirre,retrie,rettire,rretire,rteire
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
Relative frequency of common misspelling types for retire
Misspelling Variants of "retire"
Frequency rank: #6,613 in English
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Nearby English words
Other entries that begin with the letter R in our English index: