sterol
/ˈstɛɹɒl/
"sterol" is a 6-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“sterol” is uncommon English (frequency #87,866 among 54,294 “S” headwords), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- #87,866
- frequency rank, English
- 54,294
- “S” headwords
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - Any steroid that contains a hydroxyl group in the 3-position of the A-ring.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | sterol |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /ˈstɛɹɒl/ |
| Letters | 6 |
| Frequency rank | #87,866 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “sterol” sits in English frequency
Rare enough to double-check
sterol is uncommon English at frequency #87,866 among 54,294 “S” headwords, classed as anoun, transcribed /ˈstɛɹɒl/. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "Any steroid that contains a hydroxyl group in the 3-position of the A-ring.".
sterol doesn't appear in our generated misspelling index, since its letter pattern doesn't lend itself to common typo substitutions. No close-neighbour confusable shows up for this headword in our dataset, a sign it's visually distinctive enough not to be mixed up with another word.
Etymologically, the entry records: From 1913; back-formation from cholesterol. The correct English form is sterol, spelled S-T-E-R-O-L.
Definition
- 1Any steroid that contains a hydroxyl group in the 3-position of the A-ring.
Etymology
From 1913; back-formation from cholesterol.
Synonyms
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 “sterol”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is S-T-E-R-O-L - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /ˈstɛɹɒl/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Browse more English words and confusable pairs in the same reference. English words
Other uncommon English words near this rank
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.