shut up
/ʃʌt ʌp/
"shut-up" is a 6-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“shut 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
- 7
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - To close (a building) so that no one can enter.
Corpus desk
Index EN-shut-up · shut up · English
shut up · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
- LEN-LONG 7 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 | shut up |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Verb |
| IPA | /ʃʌt ʌp/ |
| Letters | 7 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “shut up” in English
Rare enough to double-check
shut up is uncommon English outside the top frequency list, classed as averb, transcribed /ʃʌt ʌp/. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 5 senses are on record.
shut up has no tracked misspelling variants, a straightforward case of a spelling with little room for common typos. No confusable counterpart is on file for this word, since its spelling is unusual enough that it doesn't cluster with a lookalike.
No explicit etymology string is stored 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 shut up, spelled S-H-U-T- -U-P.
Definition
- 1To close (a building) so that no one can enter.
- 2To terminate (a business).
- 3To put (someone or something) in a secure enclosed space, such as a room or container.
- 4Of a person, to stop talking (said by someone, often one in authority, after one has said something annoying, irrelevant, or false, during a period of peace and quiet, or when one is not allowed to talk) or arguing, or (of a person or thing) making noise.
- 5To murder, kill.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how shut up appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
The wicked prince was shut up in the castle dungeon.
The engineer had shut the locomotive up in the shed for twenty years.
This word in other languages
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.