stalking
/ˈstɔːkɪŋ/
"stalking" is a 8-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“stalking” is a moderately-common English word, ranked #12,332 in English word frequency and used as a verb.
- #12,332
- frequency rank, English
- 8
- letters
- 13
- tracked misspellings
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - present participle and gerund of stalk
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 | stalking |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Verb |
| IPA | /ˈstɔːkɪŋ/ |
| Letters | 8 |
| Frequency rank | #12,332 |
| Misspellings tracked | 13 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “stalking” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for stalking is 8 letters long, classified as a verb, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /ˈstɔːkɪŋ/. Corpus data places it at rank #12,332 in overall English word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it. The dominant gloss from Wiktionary reads: "present participle and gerund of stalk".
Our generated misspelling index lists 13 likely wrong-spelling variants for stalking, with forms such as "satlking", "sstalking", and "stakling". Every one of these variants traces to a single-character edit -- an added or dropped letter, a swapped consonant, or a vowel swap -- the kind of slip a spell-checker is built to catch. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "staying", "stating", "staring", and more, since the words sound or look close enough that writers reach for the wrong one mid-sentence.
No borrowing history is documented for this entry, leaving phoneme-to-grapheme mapping as the best guide to its spelling rather than a borrowing history. The correct English form is stalking, spelled S-T-A-L-K-I-N-G.
Definition
- 1present participle and gerund of stalk
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: satlking,sstalking,stakling,stalikng,stalkign,stalkingg,stalkinng,stalkking,stalknig,stallking,stlaking,sttalking,tsalking
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of stalking - measured in single-character edits (insert, delete, or substitute a letter). Larger bars are easier to catch; one-edit slips are the sneakiest.
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 “stalking”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is S-T-A-L-K-I-N-G - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /ˈstɔːkɪŋ/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “staying” - see the side-by-side comparison. stalking vs staying
- 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.