speed up
/spiːd.ˈʌp/
"speed-up" is a 7-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“speed up” is uncommon English (outside the top frequency list), classed as a verb. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency English
- 8
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - To accelerate; to increase speed.
Corpus desk
Index EN-speed-up · speed up · English
speed up · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
- LEN-LONG 8 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 | speed up |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Verb |
| IPA | /spiːd.ˈʌp/ |
| Letters | 8 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “speed up” in English
Rare enough to double-check
speed up is uncommon English outside the top frequency list, classed as averb, transcribed /spiːd.ˈʌp/. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 2 senses are on record.
No generated misspelling entries exist for speed up in our index, which points to an orthography that plays by predictable English rules. This entry stands alone in our confusable dataset, since its spelling is unusual enough that it doesn't cluster with a lookalike.
Our source data has no etymology on file for this entry, so its spelling is best explained by sound-to-letter mapping rather than etymology. The correct English form is speed up, spelled S-P-E-E-D- -U-P.
Definition
- 1To accelerate; to increase speed.
- 2To accelerate (something): to increase its speed, to make it go faster.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how speed up appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
The car sped up as it went around the corner.
You shouldn't speed up your car when you go around corners.
Synonyms
This word in other languages
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.