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rocket

Definition, pronunciation, etymology, and usage for the English word. Free spelling reference powered by Wiktionary.

Letters

6 characters

Language

English

word origin

Source

Wiktionary

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Detailed reference entry for the English word "rocket", 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 "rocket" 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 "rocket" for academic writing, checking homophone confusion, or exploring etymological origins, this page provides a citation-backed, free reference that requires no sign-up.

rocket is aEnglishnoun. It means: A projectile. Pronounced /ˈɹɒk.ɪt/. It ranks #4,264 in English word frequency. Often confused with rocks and rocky.

Key facts for rocket
PropertyValue
Headwordrocket
LanguageEnglish
Part of speechNoun
IPA/ˈɹɒk.ɪt/
Letters6
Frequency rank#4,264
Misspellings tracked9
Confusable pairs10
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Frequency rank visualization

Position of rocket in English word frequency (lower rank = more common)

Source: Wordfreq corpus

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

The English entry for rocket is 6 letters long, classified as anoun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /ˈɹɒk.ɪt/. Corpus data places it at rank #4,264 in overall English word frequency, indicating it appears regularly in written and spoken text.Wiktionary records 9 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.

Our Hunspell-derived misspelling index lists 9 documented wrong-spelling variants for rocket, with forms such as "orcket", "rcoket", and "roccket". 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 10 confusable-pair relationships, "rocks", "rocky", "Rockies", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.

Etymologically, the entry records: From Italian rocchetta, from Old Italian rocchetto (“rocket”, literally “a bobbin”), diminutive of rocca (“a distaff”), from Lombardic rocko (“spinning wheel”), from Proto-West Germanic *rokkō, from Proto-Germanic *rukkô (“a distaff, a staff with flax fibre… 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 rocket, spelled R-O-C-K-E-T, and any other sequence of those letters, regardless of how natural it feels, is a misspelling in standard orthography.

Definition

  1. 1
    A projectile.
  2. 2
    A projectile.
  3. 3
    A projectile.
  4. 4
    A projectile.
  5. 5
    Figurative uses.
  6. 6
    Figurative uses.
  7. 7
    Figurative uses.
  8. 8
    Figurative uses.
  9. 9
    Figurative uses.

Etymology

From Italian rocchetta, from Old Italian rocchetto (“rocket”, literally “a bobbin”), diminutive of rocca (“a distaff”), from Lombardic rocko (“spinning wheel”), from Proto-West Germanic *rokkō, from Proto-Germanic *rukkô (“a distaff, a staff with flax fibres tied loosely to it, used in spinning thread”). Cognate with Old High German rocco, rocko, roccho, rocho ("a distaff"; > German Rocken (“a distaff”)), Swedish rock (“a distaff”), Icelandic rokkur (“a distaff”), Middle English rocke (“a distaff”). More at rock⁴. For the meaning development, compare fuselage, ultimately from Latin fūsus (“spindle, spinning wheel”).

This word in other languages

Common misspellings

Also misspelled as: orcket,rcoket,roccket,rocekt,rockett,rockket,rockte,rokcet,rrocket

Misspelling Pattern Breakdown

Relative frequency of common misspelling types for rocket

Misspelling Variants of "rocket"

orcket6rcoket6roccket7rocekt6rockett7rockket7rockte6rokcet6
Misspelling Variants of "rocket"

Frequency rank: #4,264 in English

Frequently Asked Questions

How do you spell "rocket"?
"rocket" is spelled R-O-C-K-E-T. The IPA pronunciation is /ˈɹɒk.ɪt/.
What does "rocket" mean?
As a noun, "rocket" means: A projectile.
What words are commonly confused with "rocket"?
"rocket" is commonly confused with "rocks", "rocky", "Rockies". These words look or sound similar but have different meanings. PlainSpell provides detailed comparisons for each pair.
How do you pronounce "rocket"?
The IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) transcription for "rocket" is /ˈɹɒk.ɪt/. Click the speaker icon on the pronunciation badge above to hear it spoken aloud where audio is available.
What is the origin of the word "rocket"?
From Italian rocchetta, from Old Italian rocchetto (“rocket”, literally “a bobbin”), diminutive of rocca (“a distaff”), from Lombardic rocko (“spinning wheel”), from Proto-West Germanic *rokkō, from Proto-Germanic *rukkô (“a distaff, a staff with ... See the full etymology section above for more details.
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.

Nearby English words

Other entries that begin with the letter R in our English index:

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Data Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org), licensed under CC BY-SA & GFDL. Frequency data from Wordfreq. Misspellings derived from Hunspell dictionaries.