sew up
"sew-up" is a 5-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“sew up” is uncommon English (outside the top frequency list), classed as a verb. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency English
- 6
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - To seal by sewing.
Corpus desk
Index EN-sew-up · sew up · English
sew up · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
- LEN-LONG 6 letters
- VOW-2 2 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-THIN "S" thin
- PHOTO-UNK Peer pending
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.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | sew up |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Verb |
| Letters | 6 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “sew up” sits in English frequency
Rare enough to double-check
sew up is uncommon English outside the top frequency list, classed as averb. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 2 senses are on record.
Zero misspellings are on record for sew up in our index, typically a sign the spelling maps closely to how the word sounds. This entry stands alone in our confusable dataset, since nothing in our dataset looks or sounds close enough to cause mix-ups.
Our source data has no etymology on file for this entry, so its spelling is easiest explained by how it's pronounced rather than where it came from. The correct English form is sew up, spelled S-E-W- -U-P.
Definition
- 1To seal by sewing.
- 2To bring a matter to a full conclusion that deals with all outstanding issues or other concerns.
Definitions, pronunciation, and etymology for this entry are drawn from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org structured extract (CC BY-SA). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.
PlainSpell is rendered directly from structured Wiktionary extracts and open word-frequency lists, no number is typed in by an editor. See our editorial standards & corrections policy, the methodology behind these numbers, or report a data error. Data current as of May 6, 2026. Primary sources: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) and FrequencyWords.
Frequently Asked Questions
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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.