salty
/ˈsɒl.ti/
"salty" is a 5-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“salty” is a moderately-common English word, ranked #10,605 in English word frequency and used as an adjective.
- #10,605
- frequency rank, English
- 5
- letters
- 8
- tracked misspellings
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - Tasting of salt.
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 | salty |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Adjective |
| IPA | /ˈsɒl.ti/ |
| Letters | 5 |
| Frequency rank | #10,605 |
| Misspellings tracked | 8 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “salty” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for salty is 5 letters long, classified as an adjective, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /ˈsɒl.ti/. Corpus data places it at rank #10,605 in overall English word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it. Wiktionary records 6 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our generated misspelling index lists 8 likely wrong-spelling variants for salty, with forms such as "aslty", "sallty", and "saltty". Each of these forms differs from the correct spelling by one small edit: a doubled letter, a dropped silent letter, or a substituted vowel. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "say", "sat", "sly", and more, a pairing that trips writers up because the two words share enough sound or shape to blur together.
Etymologically, the entry records: PIE word *séh₂ls From Middle English salti, equivalent to salt + -y. Compare Saterland Frisian soaltig (“salty”), West Frisian sâltich (“salty”), Dutch zoutig (“salty”), German Low German soltig (“salty”), German salzig (“salty”). (coarse; irritated, annoy… The correct English form is salty, spelled S-A-L-T-Y.
Definition
- 1Tasting of salt.
- 2Containing salt.
- 3Coarse; provocative; earthy.
- 4Experienced, especially used to indicate a veteran of the naval services; salty dog (from salt of the sea).
- 5Irritated, annoyed, angry, bitter.
- 6Pertaining to the Sardinian language and those dialects of Catalan, spoken in the Balearic Islands and along the coast of Catalonia, that use definitive articles descended from the Latin ipse (“self”) instead of the Latin ille (“that”).
Etymology
PIE word *séh₂ls From Middle English salti, equivalent to salt + -y. Compare Saterland Frisian soaltig (“salty”), West Frisian sâltich (“salty”), Dutch zoutig (“salty”), German Low German soltig (“salty”), German salzig (“salty”). (coarse; irritated, annoyed): Referencing the sharp, 'spicy' flavor of salt. (indignant): Perhaps implying the person is a crybaby, shedding salty tears, or derived from the preceding.
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: aslty,sallty,saltty,saltyy,salyt,satly,slaty,ssalty
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of salty - 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 “salty”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is S-A-L-T-Y - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /ˈsɒl.ti/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “say” - see the side-by-side comparison. salty vs say
- 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.