slow-acting
"slow-acting" is a 10-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“slow-acting” is uncommon English (outside the top frequency list), classed as an adjective. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency English
- 11
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Taking effect slowly, not immediately.
Corpus desk
Index EN-slow-acting · slow-acting · English
slow-acting · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
- LEN-MEGA 11 letters
- VOW-3 3 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 | slow-acting |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Adjective |
| Letters | 11 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “slow-acting” sits in English frequency
Rare enough to double-check
slow-acting is uncommon English outside the top frequency list, classed as anadjective. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "Taking effect slowly, not immediately.".
The misspelling generator found no plausible variants for slow-acting, and the word's spelling is regular enough that our generator found nothing worth flagging. This headword has no recorded confusable partner, which tends to mean the word is visually distinctive enough to stand on its own.
This headword's origin isn't recorded in our source data, so any spelling logic here comes from how the word's sounds map to letters, not a documented origin story. The correct English form is slow-acting, spelled S-L-O-W---A-C-T-I-N-G.
Definition
- 1Taking effect slowly, not immediately.
Recorded use
Wiktionary exampleThese source excerpts show how slow-acting appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
This is a very slow-acting medication.
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 September 3, 2026. Primary sources: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) and FrequencyWords.
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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.