soul

/səʊl/

//səʊl// noun

By · According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA) ·

"soul" is a 4-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.

The verdict

“soul” has 5 generated spelling variants in the English index at frequency #1,649. The variants make it a useful spelling check.

#1,649
frequency rank, English
6,566
“S” headwords
5
tracked misspellings
20
confusable pairs

According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - The spirit or essence of a person usually thought to consist of one's thoughts and personality, often believed to live on after the person's death.

Corpus desk

Index EN-soul · soul · English

soul · rank #1,649 · 5 variants · 20 confusables

  • FREQ-COMMON #1,649
  • LEN-MID 4 letters
  • VOW-2 2 vowels
  • CONFUS-HIGH 20 pairs
  • VAR-MID 5 variants
  • BOOK-DENSE 6,566
  • PHOTO-FINISH silver

Nearest frequency peer: silver (-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 “soul”

Same rarity band: useful when a typo lands on a peer headword

corpus weight

What this shows “soul” sits among these FrequencyWords peers; misspelling depth is tracked separately in the edit-distance chart.

Source FrequencyWords open word-frequency list As of September 3, 2026

Visual similarity to commonly confused words

How many letter changes separate each confused pair (Levenshtein distance, normalized).

soul vs su
50% similar
soul vs sun
50% similar
soul vs sub
50% similar

Source: PlainSpell confusable corpus (Wiktionary, CC BY-SA).

Key facts for soul
PropertyValue
Headwordsoul
LanguageEnglish
Part of speechNoun
IPA/səʊl/
Letters4
Frequency rank#1,649
Misspellings tracked5
Confusable pairs20
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Frequency seat of misspelling magnet “soul”

Word frequency stretches from the small set of words we reach for constantly (left) out to the long tail barely used once in a while (right).soullands here:

#1#100#1K#10K#100K
← used constantlyrarely used →

Scale is logarithmic (each tick is 10× rarer). Same rarity band neighbours include “silver” (#1,648), “spread” (#1,650), “served” (#1,647). Among 6,566 “S” headwords, “soul” is #1,649. Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list.

A misspelling magnet

The generator records 5 spelling variants around soul (IPA /səʊl/), anoun. Corpus frequency is #1,649 among 6,566 “S” headwords. Wiktionary lists 9 senses, so context still picks the gloss.

Our generated misspelling index lists 5 likely wrong-spelling variants for soul, with forms such as "osul", "solu", and "soull". Each variant is a distinct typo pattern an edit-distance generator flags, typically a doubled-consonant error, a silent-letter drop, or a vowel substitution. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "su", "sun", "sub", and more, a pairing that trips writers up because the two words share enough sound or shape to blur together.

Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English soule, sowle, saule, sawle, from Old English sāwol (“soul, life, spirit, being”), from Proto-West Germanic *saiwalu, from Proto-Germanic *saiwalō (“soul”), of an uncertain ultimate origin (see there for further information). Cognates Cog… The correct English form is soul, spelled S-O-U-L.

Definition

  1. 1
    The spirit or essence of a person usually thought to consist of one's thoughts and personality, often believed to live on after the person's death.
  2. 2
    The spirit or essence of anything.
  3. 3
    Life, energy, vigor.
  4. 4
    Cultural consciousness and pride among people of African American heritage.
  5. 5
    A strong positive feeling of intense sensitivity and emotional fervor conveyed especially by African American performers.
  6. 6
    Soul music.
  7. 7
    A person, especially as one among many.
  8. 8
    An individual life.
  9. 9
    A kind of submanifold involved in the soul theorem of Riemannian geometry.

Recorded use

Wiktionary examples

These source excerpts show how soul appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.

  1. 1836, Hans Christian Andersen (translated into English by Mrs. H. B. Paull in 1872), The Little Mermaid "Among the daughters of the air," answered one of them. "A mermaid has not an immortal soul, nor can she obtain one unless she wins the love of a human being. On the power of another hangs her eternal destiny. But the daughters of the air, although they…
  2. No matter how early I came down, I would find him on the veranda, smoking cigarettes, or[…]. And at last I began to realize in my harassed soul that all elusion was futile, and to take such holidays as I could get, when he was off with a girl, in a spirit of thankfulness.

Etymology

From Middle English soule, sowle, saule, sawle, from Old English sāwol (“soul, life, spirit, being”), from Proto-West Germanic *saiwalu, from Proto-Germanic *saiwalō (“soul”), of an uncertain ultimate origin (see there for further information). Cognates Cognate with Scots saul, sowel (“soul”), Saterland Frisian Seele (“soul”), West Frisian siel (“soul”), Alemannic German Seel (“soul”), Central Franconian Siel (“soul”), Dutch ziel (“soul”), German Seele (“soul”), German Low German Seel (“soul”), Luxembourgish Séil (“soul, spirit”), Vilamovian zejł, zəjł, zyił (“soul”), Gothic 𐍃𐌰𐌹𐍅𐌰𐌻𐌰 (saiwala, “soul”). Scandinavian homonyms seem to have been borrowed from Old Saxon sēola. Modern Danish sjæl (“soul”), Icelandic sál (“soul”), Norwegian Bokmål sjel (“soul”), Norwegian Nynorsk sjel, sål (“soul”), Swedish själ (“soul”), Finnish sielu (“soul”) may have come from Old English sāwol.

Synonyms

cruxgist

This word in other languages

alma(Español)âme(Français)Seele(Deutsch)alma(Português)

Common misspellings

Also misspelled as:

  • osul
  • solu
  • soull
  • ssoul
  • suol

Misspelling Pattern Breakdown

How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of soul - expressed in single-character edits (insert, delete, or swap one letter). Bigger bars stand out at a glance; a one-edit slip is the hardest to catch.

osul2solu2soull1ssoul1suol2
Edit distance from "soul"

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

How do you spell "soul"?
"soul" is spelled S-O-U-L. The IPA pronunciation is /səʊl/.
What does "soul" mean?
As a noun, "soul" means: The spirit or essence of a person usually thought to consist of one's thoughts and personality, often believed to live on after the person's death.
What words are commonly confused with "soul"?
"soul" is commonly confused with "su", "sun", "sub". These words look or sound similar but have different meanings. PlainSpell provides detailed comparisons for each pair.
How do you pronounce "soul"?
The IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) transcription for "soul" is /səʊl/. Click the speaker icon on the pronunciation badge above to hear it spoken aloud where audio is available.
What is the origin of the word "soul"?
From Middle English soule, sowle, saule, sawle, from Old English sāwol (“soul, life, spirit, being”), from Proto-West Germanic *saiwalu, from Proto-Germanic *saiwalō (“soul”), of an uncertain ultimate origin (see there for further information). Co... See the full etymology section above for more details.
Is PlainSpell free to use?
Yes, PlainSpell is a completely free word reference. You can look up definitions, pronunciations, confusable pairs, homophones, and spelling corrections across 5 languages without any sign-up or subscription.

Similar English words by spelling shape

Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "soul", not the corpus desk frequency band.

Same letter count

Frequency-ranked English headwords with 4 letters (nearest by frequency rank).

rise#1,645ring#1,644HTTP#1,637gain#1,636

Similar misspelling depth

Headwords with a similar count of attested misspellings (5 here; floor ≥5).

mike5 variantsdude5 variantsrose5 variantscast5 variants

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list