slave
/sleɪv/
"slave" is a 5-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“slave” is a regularly-used English word, ranked #4,270 in English word frequency and used as a noun.
- #4,270
- frequency rank, English
- 5
- letters
- 6
- tracked misspellings
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - A person who is held in servitude as the property of another person, and whose labor (and often also whose body and life) is subject to the owner's volition and control.
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 | slave |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /sleɪv/ |
| Letters | 5 |
| Frequency rank | #4,270 |
| Misspellings tracked | 6 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “slave” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for slave is 5 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /sleɪv/. Corpus data places it at rank #4,270 in overall English word frequency, indicating it appears regularly in written and spoken text. Wiktionary records 7 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our generated misspelling index lists 6 likely wrong-spelling variants for slave, with forms such as "lsave", "slaev", and "slavve". Each of these forms differs from the correct spelling by one small edit: a doubled letter, a dropped silent letter, or a substituted vowel. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "SLE", "slay", "slaw", and more, a pairing that trips writers up because the two words share enough sound or shape to blur together.
Etymologically, the entry records: Inherited from Middle English sclave, from Old French sclave, from Medieval Latin sclavus (“slave”), from Late Latin Sclavus (“Slav”), traditionally assumed to be because Slavs were often forced into slavery in the Middle Ages. The Latin word is from Byzant… The correct English form is slave, spelled S-L-A-V-E.
Definition
- 1A person who is held in servitude as the property of another person, and whose labor (and often also whose body and life) is subject to the owner's volition and control.
- 2A drudge; one who labors or is obliged (e.g. by prior contract) to labor like a slave with limited rights, e.g. an indentured servant.
- 3An abject person.
- 4One who has no power of resistance to something, one who surrenders to or is under the domination of something.
- 5A submissive partner in a BDSM relationship who consensually submits to, sexually or personally, serving one or more masters or mistresses.
- 6A sex slave, a person who is forced against their will to perform, for another person or group, sexual acts on a regular or continuing basis.
- 7A device (such as a secondary flash or hard drive) that is subject to the control of another (a master).
Etymology
Inherited from Middle English sclave, from Old French sclave, from Medieval Latin sclavus (“slave”), from Late Latin Sclavus (“Slav”), traditionally assumed to be because Slavs were often forced into slavery in the Middle Ages. The Latin word is from Byzantine Greek Σκλάβος (Sklábos); see that entry and Slav for more. Displaced native Old English þēow. Thrall and bondsman/bondswoman, however, remain common synonyms. Doublet of ciao and Slav. An alternative hypothesis derives sclavus from Ancient Greek σκῡλεύω (skūleúō), σκῡλάω (skūláō, “to strip or despoil a slain enemy”).
Synonyms
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: lsave,slaev,slavve,sllave,slvae,sslave
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of slave - counted as single-character edits (an insertion, a deletion, or a substituted letter). The larger the bar, the easier the typo is to spot; one-edit slips are the ones that sneak past readers.
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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Using “slave”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is S-L-A-V-E - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /sleɪv/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “SLE” - see the side-by-side comparison. slave vs SLE
- Browse more English words and confusable pairs in the same reference. English words
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.