sortie
/ˈsɔːti/
"sortie" is a 6-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“sortie” has 8 generated spelling variants in the English index at frequency #46,787. The variants make it a useful spelling check.
- #46,787
- frequency rank, English
- 6,566
- “S” headwords
- 8
- tracked misspellings
- 10
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - An attack made by troops from a besieged position; a sally.
Corpus desk
Index EN-sortie · sortie · English
sortie · rank #46,787 · 8 variants · 10 confusables
- FREQ-MID #46,787
- LEN-LONG 6 letters
- VOW-3 3 vowels
- CONFUS-MID 10 pairs
- VAR-MID 8 variants
- BOOK-DENSE 6,566
- PHOTO-FINISH Sotomayor
Nearest frequency peer: Sotomayor (+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.
Rank peers near misspelling magnet “sortie”
Same rarity band: useful when a typo lands on a peer headword
- Snodgrass
Snodgrass
53,218 corpus weight
- Sophocles
Sophocles
53,216 corpus weight
- sortie
sortie
53,214 corpus weight
- Sotomayor
Sotomayor
53,213 corpus weight
- standish
standish
53,212 corpus weight
- starburst
starburst
53,211 corpus weight
What this shows “sortie” sits among these FrequencyWords peers; misspelling depth is tracked separately in the edit-distance chart.
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 | sortie |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /ˈsɔːti/ |
| Letters | 6 |
| Frequency rank | #46,787 |
| Misspellings tracked | 8 |
| Confusable pairs | 10 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Frequency seat of misspelling magnet “sortie”
A misspelling magnet
The generator records 8 spelling variants around sortie (IPA /ˈsɔːti/), anoun. Corpus frequency is #46,787 among 6,566 “S” headwords. Wiktionary lists 8 senses, so context still picks the gloss.
Our generated misspelling index lists 8 likely wrong-spelling variants for sortie, with forms such as "osrtie", "sorite", and "sorrtie". 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 10 confusable-pair relationships, "sorts", "sort", "sore", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Etymologically, the entry records: PIE word *upó The noun is borrowed from French sortie (“act of exiting; exit, way out; (military) sally, sortie”), the feminine past participle of sortir (“to exit, go out”), from Old French sortir, from Latin sortīrī, the present active infinitive of sort… The correct English form is sortie, spelled S-O-R-T-I-E.
Definition
- 1An attack made by troops from a besieged position; a sally.
- 2An operational flight carried out by a single military aircraft.
- 3An act of venturing out to do a task, etc.
- 4An act of trying to enter a new field of activity.
- 5An attacking move.
- 6An operational flight carried out by a spacecraft involving a return to Earth.
- 7Synonym of sally port (“an entry to or opening into a fortification to enable a sally”).
- 8A series of aerial photographs taken during the flight of an aircraft; (by extension) a photography session.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how sortie appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
The events of these sieges show that a bold and vigorous sortie in force might carry destruction through every part of a besieger's approaches, where the guard is injudiciously disposed and ill commanded; but that if due precautions have been observed in forming the approaches and posting the defenders, any sortie from a besieged place must be checked wit…
Their aircraft had no belly gunners and were at the mercy of Luftwaffe fighters that attacked from below. Whenever they lifted off on a mission, they departed with the knowledge that this sortie could easily be their last.
Etymology
PIE word *upó The noun is borrowed from French sortie (“act of exiting; exit, way out; (military) sally, sortie”), the feminine past participle of sortir (“to exit, go out”), from Old French sortir, from Latin sortīrī, the present active infinitive of sortior (“to cast or draw lots; to choose, select; to distribute, divide; to obtain, receive; to share”), from sors (“something used to determine chances, a lot; casting or drawing of lots; decision by lot; a share”) (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *ser- (“to bind, tie together; a thread”)), possibly influenced by surrēctus (“arisen, having been caused to arise; gotten up, having been gotten up”), the perfect passive participle of surgō (“to arise, get up, rise”), from subrigō (“to lift up; to straighten”), from sub- (prefix meaning ‘beneath, under’) + regō (“to direct, guide, steer; to govern, rule; to manage, oversee”) (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *h₃reǵ- (“to right oneself, straighten; just; right”)). The verb is derived from the noun.
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as:
- osrtie
- sorite
- sorrtie
- sortei
- sorttie
- sotrie
- srotie
- ssortie
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of sortie - measured in single-character edits (insert, delete, or substitute a letter). Larger bars are easier to catch; one-edit slips are the sneakiest.
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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Similar English words by spelling shape
Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "sortie", not the corpus desk frequency band.
Same letter count
Frequency-ranked English headwords with 6 letters (nearest by frequency rank).
Similar misspelling depth
Headwords with a similar count of attested misspellings (8 here; floor ≥5).