sprain
/spɹeɪn/
"sprain" is a 6-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“sprain” is a moderately-common English word, ranked #35,092 in English word frequency and used as a verb.
- #35,092
- frequency rank, English
- 6
- letters
- 9
- tracked misspellings
- 18
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - To weaken, as a joint, ligament, or muscle, by sudden and excessive exertion, as by wrenching; to overstrain, or stretch injuriously, but without luxation
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 | sprain |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Verb |
| IPA | /spɹeɪn/ |
| Letters | 6 |
| Frequency rank | #35,092 |
| Misspellings tracked | 9 |
| Confusable pairs | 18 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “sprain” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for sprain is 6 letters long, classified as a verb, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /spɹeɪn/. Corpus data places it at rank #35,092 in overall English word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it. The dominant gloss from Wiktionary reads: "To weaken, as a joint, ligament, or muscle, by sudden and excessive exertion, as by wrenching; to overstrain, or stretch injuriously, but without luxation".
Our generated misspelling index lists 9 likely wrong-spelling variants for sprain, with forms such as "psrain", "sparin", and "spprain". Each of these forms differs from the correct spelling by one small edit: a doubled letter, a dropped silent letter, or a substituted vowel. It also participates in 18 confusable-pair relationships, "spray", "stain", "swain", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Etymologically, the entry records: 1601, verb attested 1622. Possibly borrowed from Middle French espraindre (“to press out, to wring”), from Latin exprimere, in which case cognate to express. The correct English form is sprain, spelled S-P-R-A-I-N.
Definition
- 1To weaken, as a joint, ligament, or muscle, by sudden and excessive exertion, as by wrenching; to overstrain, or stretch injuriously, but without luxation
Etymology
1601, verb attested 1622. Possibly borrowed from Middle French espraindre (“to press out, to wring”), from Latin exprimere, in which case cognate to express.
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: psrain,sparin,spprain,sprainn,sprani,sprian,sprrain,srpain,ssprain
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of sprain - 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 “sprain”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is S-P-R-A-I-N - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /spɹeɪn/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “spray” - see the side-by-side comparison. sprain vs spray
- 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.