stance
/stæns/
"stance" is a 6-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“stance” is a regularly-used English word, ranked #6,627 in English word frequency and used as a noun.
- #6,627
- frequency rank, English
- 6
- letters
- 10
- tracked misspellings
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - The manner, pose, or posture in which one stands.
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 | stance |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /stæns/ |
| Letters | 6 |
| Frequency rank | #6,627 |
| Misspellings tracked | 10 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “stance” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for stance is 6 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /stæns/. Corpus data places it at rank #6,627 in overall English word frequency, indicating it appears regularly in written and spoken text. Wiktionary records 7 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our generated misspelling index lists 10 likely wrong-spelling variants for stance, with forms such as "satnce", "sstance", and "stacne". 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, "state", "stand", "stone", and more, since the words sound or look close enough that writers reach for the wrong one mid-sentence.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English staunce (“place to stand; battle station; position; standing in society; circumstance, situation; stanchion”), from Old French estance (“predicament; situation; sojourn, stay”) (compare modern French stance (“stanza; position one stands … The correct English form is stance, spelled S-T-A-N-C-E.
Definition
- 1The manner, pose, or posture in which one stands.
- 2One's opinion or point of view.
- 3A place to stand; a position, a site, a station.
- 4A place to stand; a position, a site, a station.
- 5A place for buses or taxis to await passengers; a bus stop, a taxi rank.
- 6A place where a fair or market is held; a location where a street trader can carry on business.
- 7A stanza.
Etymology
From Middle English staunce (“place to stand; battle station; position; standing in society; circumstance, situation; stanchion”), from Old French estance (“predicament; situation; sojourn, stay”) (compare modern French stance (“stanza; position one stands in when golfing”)), from Italian stanza (“room, standing place; stanza”), from Vulgar Latin *stantia, from Latin stō (“to stand; to remain, stay”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *steh₂- (“to stand (up)”). The word is cognate with Spanish estante (“shelf”) and a doublet of stanza. The verb is derived from the noun. Compare typologically Czech postoj (“stance (the way of holding a body); stance (point of view)”) (cognate via PIE). Also see position, posture.
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: satnce,sstance,stacne,stancce,stanec,stannce,stence,stnace,sttance,tsance
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of stance - counted as single-character edits (an insertion, a deletion, or a substituted letter). The larger the bar, the easier the typo is to spot; one-edit slips are the ones that sneak past readers.
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 “stance”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is S-T-A-N-C-E - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /stæns/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “state” - see the side-by-side comparison. stance vs state
- 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.