shortcomings
"shortcomings" is a 12-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“shortcomings” has 20 generated spelling variants in the English index at frequency #16,127. The variants make it a useful spelling check.
- #16,127
- frequency rank, English
- 54,294
- “S” headwords
- 20
- tracked misspellings
- 1
- confusable pair
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - plural of shortcoming
Corpus desk
Index EN-shortcomings · shortcomings · English
shortcomings · rank #16,127 · 20 variants · 1 confusable
- FREQ-MID #16,127
- LEN-MEGA 12 letters
- VOW-3 3 vowels
- CONFUS-LOW 1 pairs
- VAR-HIGH 20 variants
- BOOK-DENSE 54,294
- PHOTO-FINISH sham
Nearest frequency peer: sham (-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.
Frequency neighbourhood for “shortcomings”
Lower corpus rank = more everyday usage (inverted bar length for readability)
- sew
sew
83,877 corpus weight
- shaky
shaky
83,876 corpus weight
- sham
sham
83,875 corpus weight
- shortcomings
shortcomings
83,874 corpus weight
- shredded
shredded
83,873 corpus weight
- Siberia
Siberia
83,872 corpus weight
What this shows Bars show where “shortcomings” sits against the nearest ranked English headwords in the FrequencyWords band, not a reprint of letter-browse containment.
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 | shortcomings |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| Letters | 12 |
| Frequency rank | #16,127 |
| Misspellings tracked | 20 |
| Confusable pairs | 1 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “shortcomings” sits in English frequency
A misspelling magnet
The generator records 20 spelling variants around shortcomings, anoun. Corpus frequency is #16,127 among 54,294 “S” headwords. Dominant gloss: "plural of shortcoming".
Our generated misspelling index lists 20 likely wrong-spelling variants for shortcomings, with forms such as "hsortcomings", "shhortcomings", and "shorctomings". Every one of these variants traces to a single-character edit -- an added or dropped letter, a swapped consonant, or a vowel swap -- the kind of slip a spell-checker is built to catch. It also participates in 1 confusable-pair relationship, "shortcoming", where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
This entry carries no recorded etymology, so spelling patterns must be inferred from the word's phoneme-to-grapheme mapping rather than from a documented borrowing chain. The correct English form is shortcomings, spelled S-H-O-R-T-C-O-M-I-N-G-S.
Definition
- 1plural of shortcoming
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as:
- hsortcomings
- shhortcomings
- shorctomings
- shorrtcomings
- shortccomings
- shortcmoings
- shortcoimngs
- shortcomigns
- shortcominggs
- shortcomingss
- shortcominngs
- shortcominsg
- shortcommings
- shortcomnigs
- shortocmings
- shorttcomings
- shotrcomings
- shrotcomings
- sohrtcomings
- sshortcomings
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of shortcomings - expressed in single-character edits (insert, delete, or swap one letter). Bigger bars stand out at a glance; a one-edit slip is the hardest to catch.
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.
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
How do you spell "shortcomings"?
What does "shortcomings" mean?
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Similar English words by spelling shape
Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "shortcomings", not the corpus desk frequency band.
Same letter count
Frequency-ranked English headwords with 12 letters (nearest by frequency rank).
Similar misspelling depth
Headwords with a similar count of attested misspellings (20 here; floor ≥5).
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.