seaway
"seaway" is a 6-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“seaway” is uncommon English (frequency #51,381 among 6,566 “S” headwords), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- #51,381
- frequency rank, English
- 6,566
- “S” headwords
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - A lane or route at sea that is regularly used by ships; a sea lane or trade route.
Corpus desk
Index EN-seaway · seaway · English
seaway · rank #51,381 · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-RARE #51,381
- LEN-LONG 6 letters
- VOW-4 4 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-DENSE 6,566
- PHOTO-FINISH semiautomatic
Nearest frequency peer: semiautomatic (+1 rank slots)
Read with this headword: Spelling guide for this pattern
Desk codes from Wiktionary headword shape, FrequencyWords rank tier, confusable-pair count, generated misspelling depth, letter-cohort book size, and photo-finish peer. Not a difficulty grade.
Long-tail ranks near “seaway”
Sparse band: bars invert rank so rarer forms read shorter
- RSV
RSV
48,627 corpus weight
- rubella
rubella
48,626 corpus weight
- seaway
seaway
48,620 corpus weight
- semiautomat…
semiautomatic
48,619 corpus weight
- SFX
SFX
48,618 corpus weight
- sharpener
sharpener
48,616 corpus weight
What this shows Long-tail view: where “seaway” sits against similarly uncommon English ranks.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | seaway |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| Letters | 6 |
| Frequency rank | #51,381 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “seaway” in English
Rare enough to double-check
seaway is uncommon English at frequency #51,381 among 6,566 “S” headwords, classed as anoun. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 3 senses are on record.
We couldn't generate a plausible misspelling set for seaway, and the word's spelling is regular enough that our generator found nothing worth flagging. Our confusable-pair dataset has no match for it, which typically means the spelling is too distinctive to be mistaken for another word.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English seewey, from Old English sǣweġ (“a seaway, a path through the sea”), equivalent to sea + way. Compare Saterland Frisian Seegong (“seaway, swell”), German Seegang (“seaway, swell”). The correct English form is seaway, spelled S-E-A-W-A-Y.
Definition
- 1A lane or route at sea that is regularly used by ships; a sea lane or trade route.
- 2An inland waterway used by seagoing shipping.
- 3The headway of a vessel.
Recorded use
Wiktionary exampleThese source excerpts show how seaway appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
The coracle […] was a very safe boat for a person of my height and weight, both buoyant and clever in a seaway; but she was the most cross-grained, lop-sided craft to manage.
Etymology
From Middle English seewey, from Old English sǣweġ (“a seaway, a path through the sea”), equivalent to sea + way. Compare Saterland Frisian Seegong (“seaway, swell”), German Seegang (“seaway, swell”).
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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Similar English words by spelling shape
Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "seaway", not the corpus desk frequency band.
Same letter count
Frequency-ranked English headwords with 6 letters (nearest by frequency rank).