stubborn
stub·born/ˈstʌbɚn/adjective, noun
stubborn is spelled S-T-U-B-B-O-R-N, 2 syllables: stub·born. The wrong spelling people search most is stubbourn: about 10 Bing searches a month in the United States (September 2025 to August 2026), about 1 in 213 of all searches for the word. Stubborn is an adjective meaning “Refusing to move or to change one's opinion; obstinate; firmly resisting; persistent in doing something”.
How many letters and syllables are in stubborn?
| Letters | 8: S-T-U-B-B-O-R-N |
|---|---|
| Syllables | 2: stub·born |
| In writing | 5.8 times per million words; the 10,196th most frequent word form |
| Wrong spellings searched | 1; the most searched, stubbourn, about 10 Bing searches a month (all of them) |
Sources: letters and syllables from the English Wiktionary's hyphenation or pronunciation; written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media); Bing searches in the United States: the average month from September 2025 to August 2026 (Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, read September 30, 2026).
How do you spell stubborn?
Stubborn is spelled S-T-U-B-B-O-R-N. One wrong spelling is searched or written often enough to measure; together they are about 1 in 213 of the searches for stubborn in either form.
Bing searches in the United States: the average month from September 2025 to August 2026 (Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, read September 30, 2026). Wrong spellings are taken from Wiktionary entries tagged "misspelling" and its obsolete or nonstandard forms, Wikipedia's Lists of common misspellings and the codespell dictionary, then measured. The proofreader's marks show the change that corrects each one.
How common is stubborn?
Stubborn appears 5.8 times per million words in written English, the 10,196th 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 stubborn?
- US /ˈstʌbɚn/
- UK /ˈstʌbən/
- /ˈstʊbən/
Stubborn has 2 syllables, split stub·born in writing.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: En-us-stubborn.ogg, En-uk-stubborn.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Forms of stubborn
- more stubborn comparative
- most stubborn superlative
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
What does stubborn mean?
The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).
adjective
- 1
Refusing to move or to change one's opinion; obstinate; firmly resisting; persistent in doing something.
People are pretty stubborn about their political beliefs, so why bother arguing?
- 2
Physically stiff and inflexible; not easily melted or worked.
noun
- 1
informalStubbornness.
- 2
Ellipsis of stubborn disease (“a disease of citrus trees”).
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Stubborn in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
In the sense refusing to move or change one's opinion:
| Language | Words |
|---|---|
| French | têtu, entêté, borné |
| German | stur, dickköpfig |
| Portuguese | teimoso, cabeça-dura, cabeçudo, casmurro, turrão |
| Spanish | testarudo, cabezota, terco, cabezadura, porfiado, tozudo |
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 stubborn come from?
From Middle English stiborne, stibourne, stoburn, stoburne, styburne, stiborn, of uncertain origin; one hypothesis is that it may be from Old English *stybbor, from Old English stybb (“a stump, stub”) + -or (adjective-formation suffix, as in bitor, whence English bitter).
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).