sport
/spɔːt/
"sport" is a 5-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“sport” is a regularly-used English word, ranked #1,921 in English word frequency and used as a noun.
- #1,921
- frequency rank, English
- 5
- letters
- 8
- tracked misspellings
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - Any activity that uses physical exertion or skills competitively under a set of rules that is not based on aesthetics.
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 | sport |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /spɔːt/ |
| Letters | 5 |
| Frequency rank | #1,921 |
| Misspellings tracked | 8 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “sport” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for sport is 5 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /spɔːt/. Corpus data places it at rank #1,921 in overall English word frequency, indicating it appears regularly in written and spoken text. Wiktionary records 14 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our generated misspelling index lists 8 likely wrong-spelling variants for sport, with forms such as "psort", "soprt", and "sporrt". 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, "SPR", "spot", "spur", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English sporten (“to divert, disport”, verb) and sport, spoort, sporte (noun), apheretic shortenings of disporten (verb) and disport, disporte (noun), from Old French desporter (“to divert, amuse, please, play; to seek amusement”), etymologicall… The correct English form is sport, spelled S-P-O-R-T.
Definition
- 1Any activity that uses physical exertion or skills competitively under a set of rules that is not based on aesthetics.
- 2A person who exhibits either good or bad sportsmanship.
- 3Somebody who behaves or reacts in an admirably good-natured manner, e.g. to being teased or to losing a game; a good sport.
- 4Something fun, pastime; amusement.
- 5Mockery, making fun; derision.
- 6A toy; a plaything; an object of mockery.
- 7Gaming for money as in racing, hunting, or fishing.
- 8A plant or an animal, or part of a plant or animal, which has some peculiarity not usually seen in the species; an abnormal variety or growth. The term encompasses both mutants and organisms with non-genetic developmental abnormalities such as birth defects.
- 9A sportsman; a gambler.
- 10One who consorts with disreputable people, including prostitutes.
- 11An amorous dalliance.
- 12A friend or acquaintance (chiefly used when speaking to the friend in question)
- 13Term of endearment used by an adult for a child, usually a boy.
- 14Play; idle jingle.
Etymology
From Middle English sporten (“to divert, disport”, verb) and sport, spoort, sporte (noun), apheretic shortenings of disporten (verb) and disport, disporte (noun), from Old French desporter (“to divert, amuse, please, play; to seek amusement”), etymologically meaning "to carry away (the mind from serious matters)," from des- + porter, from Latin dis- + Latin portāre, ultimately from Latin deportāre, from de- + portāre, from Proto-Indo-European *per- (“to lead, pass over”)). Replaced native English laik, lake (“sport, fun, amusement”), and Middle English spile, spyl (“fun, sport, play”). More at disport. Doublet of disport and deport.
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: psort,soprt,sporrt,sportt,spotr,spport,sprot,ssport
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of sport - 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.
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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Using “sport”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is S-P-O-R-T - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /spɔːt/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “SPR” - see the side-by-side comparison. sport vs SPR
- Browse more English words and confusable pairs in the same reference. English words
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.