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spontaneous

spon·ta·ne·ous/spɑnˈteɪ.ni.əs/adjective

spontaneous is spelled S-P-O-N-T-A-N-E-O-U-S, 4 syllables: spon·ta·ne·ous. The wrong spelling people search most is spontanous: about 30 Bing searches a month in the United States (September 2025 to August 2026), about 1 in 81 of all searches for the word. Spontaneous is an adjective meaning “Self-directed; happening or acting without external cause or instigation; proceeding from natural feeling…”.

How many letters and syllables are in spontaneous?

Letters11: S-P-O-N-T-A-N-E-O-U-S
Syllables4: spon·ta·ne·ous
In writing5.1 times per million words; the 11,015th most frequent word form
Wrong spellings searched1; the most searched, spontanous, about 30 Bing searches a month (all of them)
Rhymes with

Sources: letters and syllables from the English Wiktionary's hyphenation or pronunciation; 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 do you spell spontaneous?

Spontaneous is spelled S-P-O-N-T-A-N-E-O-U-S. One wrong spelling is searched or written often enough to measure; together they are about 1 in 81 of the searches for spontaneous in either form.

spontaneousthe right spelling2,410 searches a month
spontanousa missing e30 searches a month

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). Wrong spellings are taken from Wiktionary entries tagged "misspelling" and its obsolete or nonstandard forms, Wikipedia's Lists of common misspellings and the codespell dictionary, then measured. The proofreader's marks show the change that corrects each one.

How common is spontaneous?

Spontaneous appears 5.1 times per million words in written English, the 11,015th 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 spontaneous?

  • UK /spɒnˈteɪ.ni.əs/
  • US /spɑnˈteɪ.ni.əs/

Spontaneous has 4 syllables, split spon·ta·ne·ous in writing.

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

What rhymes with spontaneous?

5 words on PlainSpell end in the same sounds as spontaneous from its last stressed vowel (/eɪniəs/):

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 spontaneous

  • more spontaneous comparative
  • most spontaneous superlative

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

What does spontaneous mean?

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

adjective

  1. 1

    Self-directed; happening or acting without external cause or instigation; proceeding from natural feeling, temperament, or momentary impulse.

    He made a spontaneous offer of help.

  2. 2

    Done by one's own free choice, or without planning.

  3. 3

    Controlled and directed internally; self-active; spontaneous movement characteristic of living things.

  4. 4

    Produced without being planted or without human cultivation or labor.

  5. 5

    Sudden, without warning.

  6. 6

    Said or done without prior planning or prior writing.

    He made spontaneous remarks in the court, after being asked an unexpected question.

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

Spontaneous in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese

LanguageWords
Frenchspontané, volontaire (self generated; happening without any apparent…), impulsif (arising from a momentary impulse), réflexe (controlled and directed internally)
Germanspontan (self generated; happening without any apparent…)
Portugueseespontâneo (self generated; happening without any apparent…)
Spanishespontáneo (self generated; happening without any apparent…)

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 spontaneous come from?

Learned borrowing from Late Latin spontāneus.

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

What to look up after spontaneous