rustling
"rustling" is a 8-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“rustling” is a moderately-common English word, ranked #35,058 in English word frequency and used as a verb.
- #35,058
- frequency rank, English
- 8
- letters
- 13
- tracked misspellings
- 6
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - present participle and gerund of rustle
Visual similarity to commonly confused words
How many letter changes separate each confused pair (Levenshtein distance, normalized).
Source: PlainSpell confusable corpus (Wiktionary, CC BY-SA).
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | rustling |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Verb |
| Letters | 8 |
| Frequency rank | #35,058 |
| Misspellings tracked | 13 |
| Confusable pairs | 6 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “rustling” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for rustling is 8 letters long, classified as a verb. Corpus data places it at rank #35,058 in overall English word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it. The dominant gloss from Wiktionary reads: "present participle and gerund of rustle".
Our generated misspelling index lists 13 likely wrong-spelling variants for rustling, with forms such as "rrustling", "rsutling", and "ruslting". Each variant is a distinct typo pattern an edit-distance generator flags, typically a doubled-consonant error, a silent-letter drop, or a vowel substitution. It also participates in 6 confusable-pair relationships, "ruling", "rushing", "resting", and more, a pairing that trips writers up because the two words share enough sound or shape to blur together.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English *rustlynge, rustland, from Old English hrīstlende, *hrȳstlende, present participle of Old English *hrȳstlan (“to rustle”), equivalent to rustle + -ing. The correct English form is rustling, spelled R-U-S-T-L-I-N-G.
Definition
- 1present participle and gerund of rustle
Etymology
From Middle English *rustlynge, rustland, from Old English hrīstlende, *hrȳstlende, present participle of Old English *hrȳstlan (“to rustle”), equivalent to rustle + -ing.
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: rrustling,rsutling,ruslting,russtling,rustilng,rustlign,rustlingg,rustlinng,rustlling,rustlnig,rusttling,rutsling,urstling
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of rustling - measured in single-character edits (insert, delete, or substitute a letter). Larger bars are easier to catch; one-edit slips are the sneakiest.
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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Using “rustling”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is R-U-S-T-L-I-N-G - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Don't mix it up with “ruling” - see the side-by-side comparison. rustling vs ruling
- Browse more English words and confusable pairs in the same reference. English words
Data Source
Wiktionary (via kaikki.org), licensed under CC BY-SA & GFDL. Word ordering uses an open word-frequency list; misspelling variants are generated by edit-distance from the correct headword.