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PlainSpell

sliver

/ˈslɪvɚ/noun, verb

sliver is spelled S-L-I-V-E-R: 6 letters and 2 syllables. It appears about once in every 1 million words in written English, the 29,270th most frequent word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). As a noun, sliver means “A long piece cut or rent off; a sharp, slender fragment” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). The plural of sliver is slivers.

How many letters and syllables are in sliver?

Letters6: S-L-I-V-E-R
Syllables2 (from its American pronunciation)
In writingabout once in every 1 million words; the 29,270th most frequent word form
Wrong spellings searchednone measured in search
Pairs people search
Rhymes with
Same letters

Sources: letters and syllables from the English Wiktionary's hyphenation or pronunciation and the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary; written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media); Bing searches in the United States: the average month from September 2025 to August 2026 (Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, read September 30, 2026); rhymes and same-letter words are computed by PlainSpell from its own word list.

How common is sliver?

Sliver appears about once in every 1 million words in written English, the 29,270th most frequent word form in the list.

Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).

How do you pronounce sliver?

  • UK /ˈslɪvə/
  • US /ˈslɪvɚ/
  • /ˈsləvə/

Sliver has 2 syllables (counted from its American pronunciation in the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary).

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: En-au-sliver.ogg, En-us-sliver.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).

Words people confuse with sliver

Word pairs people search, with the monthly searches for “a vs b” (G: Google, B: Bing, United States).

slither vs sliver0 B

Sources: Google and Bing searches (September 2025 to August 2026, through DataForSEO); English Wiktionary (homophones, alternative spellings).

What rhymes with sliver?

7 words on PlainSpell end in the same sounds as sliver from its last stressed vowel (/ɪvəɹ/):

Spelled with the same letters in another order: silver.

Computed by PlainSpell from the pronunciations in the English Wiktionary (dump of September 2, 2026): a rhyme shares every sound from the last stressed vowel to the end; ordered by written frequency (wordfreq 3.1).

Forms of sliver

  • slivers plural, present, singular, he/she/it
  • slivering participle, present
  • slivered participle, past

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

What does sliver mean?

The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).

noun

  1. 1

    A long piece cut or rent off; a sharp, slender fragment.

  2. 2

    CanadaSpecifically, a splinter caught under the skin.

  3. 3

    A strand, or slender roll, of cotton or other fiber in a loose, untwisted state, produced by a carding machine and ready for the roving or slubbing which precedes spinning.

  4. 4

    Bait made of pieces of small fish.

  5. 5

    USA narrow high-rise apartment building.

  6. 6

    A small amount of something; a drop in the bucket; a shred.

verb

  1. 1

    To cut or divide into long, thin pieces, or into very small pieces; to cut or rend lengthwise; to slit.

    to sliver wood

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

Sliver in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese

LanguageWords
Frenchécharde, éclat (long piece cut or rent off; a sharp, slender…), languette (bait made of pieces of small fish), tour, gratte-ciel (New York: narrow high-rise apartment building)
GermanSplitter, kleiner Teil, kleines Stück, Spreißel (long piece cut or rent off; a sharp, slender…), Band, Faserband (strand or slender roll of cotton or other fiber…)
Portugueselasca (long piece cut or rent off; a sharp, slender…)
Spanishastilla, tira, esquirla, rebanadita (long piece cut or rent off; a sharp, slender…), cebo lengüeta (bait made of pieces of small fish), edificio (New York: narrow high-rise apartment building)

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Translations are Wiktionary's, by sense; a linked word has its own PlainSpell page.

Where does sliver come from?

From Middle English slivere, sliver from Middle English sliven (“to cut, cleave, split”), from Old English slīfan (as in tōslīfan (“to split, split up”)).

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

What to look up after sliver