Skip to main content
PlainSpell

straw

/stɹɔ/noun, adjective, verb

straw is spelled S-T-R-A-W: 5 letters and one syllable. It appears 9.8 times per million words in written English, the 7,224th most frequent word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). As a noun, straw means “A dried stalk of a cereal plant” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). The plural of straw is straws.

How many letters and syllables are in straw?

Letters5: S-T-R-A-W
Syllables1 (from its American pronunciation)
In writing9.8 times per million words; the 7,224th most frequent word form
Wrong spellings searchednone measured in search
Rhymes with
Same letters

Sources: letters and syllables from the English Wiktionary's hyphenation or pronunciation and the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary; written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media); rhymes and same-letter words are computed by PlainSpell from its own word list.

How common is straw?

Straw appears 9.8 times per million words in written English, the 7,224th most frequent word form in the list.

Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).

How do you pronounce straw?

  • UK /stɹɔː/
  • US /stɹɔ/
  • /stɹɑ/

Straw has one syllable (counted from its American pronunciation in the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary).

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: En-us-straw.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).

What rhymes with straw?

The 12 most written words on PlainSpell end in the same sounds as straw from its last stressed vowel (/ɔ/):

Spelled with the same letters in another order: swart.

Computed by PlainSpell from the pronunciations in the English Wiktionary (dump of September 2, 2026): a rhyme shares every sound from the last stressed vowel to the end; ordered by written frequency (wordfreq 3.1).

Forms of straw

  • straws plural, present, singular, he/she/it
  • strawing participle, present
  • strawed participle, past

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

What does straw mean?

The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).

noun

  1. 1

    A dried stalk of a cereal plant.

  2. 2

    Such dried stalks considered collectively; this bulk matter may be a chief salable product, a by-product, fodder, bedding, or green manure, depending on region and on current market conditions.

  3. 3

    A drinking straw.

  4. 4

    A pale, yellowish beige colour, like that of a dried straw.

  5. 5

    Anything proverbially worthless; the least possible thing.

    to not care a straw

  6. 6

    A straw owner.

adjective

  1. 1

    Made of straw.

    straw hat

  2. 2

    Of a pale, yellowish beige colour, like that of a dried straw.

  3. 3

    Imaginary, but presented as real.

    A straw enemy built up in the media to seem like a real threat, which then collapses like a balloon.

verb

  1. 1

    To scatter or to spread loosely.

  2. 2

    To lay straw around plants to protect them from frost.

  3. 3

    obsoleteslangTo sell straws on the streets in order to cover the giving to the purchaser of things usually banned, such as pornography.

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

Straw in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese

LanguageWords
Frenchpaille, fétu (a dried stalk of a cereal plant), jaune paille (colour)
GermanHalm, Strohhalm (a dried stalk of a cereal plant), strohfarben, strohgelb (colour), Stroh (dried stalks considered collectively), Stroh- (made of straw)
Portuguesepalha (a dried stalk of a cereal plant)
Spanishpaja (a dried stalk of a cereal plant), pajizo, pajiza (colour), pajoso (made of straw)

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Translations are Wiktionary's, by sense; a linked word has its own PlainSpell page.

Where does straw come from?

From Middle English straugh, strauȝ, straw, strawe, strea, streuw, from Old English strēaw, strēow, from Proto-West Germanic *strau, from Proto-Germanic *strawą (“that which is strewn, straw”), from Proto-Indo-European *strew- (“to spread, strew”), from *sterh₃- (“to extend, spread”), from *ster- (“barren, infertile”).

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

What to look up after straw