say
Definition, pronunciation, etymology, and usage for the English word. Free spelling reference powered by Wiktionary.
Letters
3 characters
Language
English
word origin
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Detailed reference entry for the English word "say", 3-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 "say" 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 "say" for academic writing, checking homophone confusion, or exploring etymological origins, this page provides a citation-backed, free reference that requires no sign-up.
say is aEnglishverb. It means: To pronounce. Pronounced /seɪ/. It ranks #135 in English word frequency. Often confused with so and se.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | say |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Verb |
| IPA | /seɪ/ |
| Letters | 3 |
| Frequency rank | #135 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Frequency rank visualization
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for say is 3 letters long, classified as averb, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /seɪ/. Corpus data places it at rank #135 in overall English word frequency, putting it firmly in the everyday core of the language.Wiktionary records 8 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
No frequent misspelling variants are recorded for say in our index, suggesting the orthography either follows predictable English patterns or the word is uncommon enough that typo corpora lack signal.It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "so", "se", "SC", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English seyen, seien, seggen, from Old English seċġan (“to say, speak”), from Proto-West Germanic *saggjan, from Proto-Germanic *sagjaną (“to say”), from Proto-Indo-European *sokʷ-h₁-yé-, a suffixed o-grade form of *sekʷ- (“to say”). Cognates Co… 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 say, spelled S-A-Y, and any other sequence of those letters, regardless of how natural it feels, is a misspelling in standard orthography.
Definition
- 1To pronounce.
- 2To recite.
- 3To tell, either verbally or in writing.
- 4To indicate in a written form.
- 5To have a common expression; used in singular passive voice or plural active voice to indicate a rumor or well-known fact.
- 6Suppose, assume; used to mark an example, supposition or hypothesis.
- 7To speak; to express an opinion; to make answer; to reply.
- 8To bet as a wager on an outcome; by extension, used to express belief in an outcome by the speaker.
Etymology
From Middle English seyen, seien, seggen, from Old English seċġan (“to say, speak”), from Proto-West Germanic *saggjan, from Proto-Germanic *sagjaną (“to say”), from Proto-Indo-European *sokʷ-h₁-yé-, a suffixed o-grade form of *sekʷ- (“to say”). Cognates Cognate with North Frisian sai, seede, sii, sjide, sooi, säie (“to say”), West Frisian sizze (“to say”), Alemannic German ŝchége, ŝchegi, séege, säge, sägä (“to say”), Bavarian sogn, soon, sågn (“to say”), Dutch zeggen (“to say”), German sagen (“to say”), Low German seggen (“to say, tell”), Luxembourgish soen (“to say”), Yiddish זאָגן (zogn, “to say”), Danish sige (“to say”), Faroese siga (“to say”), Icelandic segja (“to say”), Jamtish segi (“to say”), Norwegian Bokmål si (“to say”), Norwegian Nynorsk segja, seia, seie (“to say, tell”), Swedish säga (“to say”). The adverb and interjection are from the verb.
This word in other languages
Frequency rank: #135 in English
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Nearby English words
Other entries that begin with the letter S in our English index: