sty
/staɪ/
"sty" is a 3-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“sty” is uncommon English (frequency #55,123 among 6,566 “S” headwords), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- #55,123
- frequency rank, English
- 6,566
- “S” headwords
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - A pen or enclosure for swine.
Corpus desk
Index EN-sty · sty · English
sty · rank #55,123 · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-RARE #55,123
- LEN-MID 3 letters
- VOW-1 1 vowel
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-DENSE 6,566
- PHOTO-FINISH strived
Nearest frequency peer: strived (-1 rank slots)
Read with this headword: Spelling guide for this pattern
Desk codes from Wiktionary headword shape, FrequencyWords rank tier, confusable-pair count, generated misspelling depth, letter-cohort book size, and photo-finish peer. Not a difficulty grade.
Long-tail ranks near “sty”
Sparse band: bars invert rank so rarer forms read shorter
- stents
stents
44,881 corpus weight
- stooping
stooping
44,880 corpus weight
- strived
strived
44,879 corpus weight
- sty
sty
44,878 corpus weight
- subjugate
subjugate
44,877 corpus weight
- sublet
sublet
44,876 corpus weight
What this shows Long-tail view: where “sty” sits against similarly uncommon English ranks.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | sty |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /staɪ/ |
| Letters | 3 |
| Frequency rank | #55,123 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “sty” in English
Rare enough to double-check
sty is uncommon English at frequency #55,123 among 6,566 “S” headwords, classed as anoun, transcribed /staɪ/. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 2 senses are on record.
Our edit-distance generator produced no likely misspellings for sty, and the word's spelling is regular enough that our generator found nothing worth flagging. No confusable counterpart is on file for this word, suggesting its spelling stands apart enough that readers rarely confuse it with something else.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English sty, from Old English stī, stiġ (“sty, pen, a wooden enclosure; hall”, chiefly in compounds). Cognate with German Stiege (“wooden crate”), dialectal German Steige (“hen-coop”), Danish sti (“sty, enclosure for swine, sheep, hens, etc.”), … The correct English form is sty, spelled S-T-Y.
Definition
- 1A pen or enclosure for swine.
- 2A messy, dirty or debauched place.
Recorded use
Wiktionary exampleThese source excerpts show how sty appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
To roll with pleasure in a sensual sty.
Etymology
From Middle English sty, from Old English stī, stiġ (“sty, pen, a wooden enclosure; hall”, chiefly in compounds). Cognate with German Stiege (“wooden crate”), dialectal German Steige (“hen-coop”), Danish sti (“sty, enclosure for swine, sheep, hens, etc.”), Swedish stia (“sty for pigs, geese, etc.”), Norwegian sti (“flock of sheep”), Icelandic stía (“a kennel”).
This word in other languages
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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Similar English words by spelling shape
Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "sty", not the corpus desk frequency band.
Same letter count
Frequency-ranked English headwords with 3 letters (nearest by frequency rank).