Skip to main content
PlainSpell

sun

/sʌn/noun, verb

sun is spelled S-U-N: 3 letters and one syllable. It appears 93 times per million words in written English, the 1,144th most frequent word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). People search “son vs sun” about 110 times a month (Google, United States). As a noun, sun means “A star, especially when seen as the centre of any single solar system” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). The plural of sun is suns.

How many letters and syllables are in sun?

Letters3: S-U-N
Syllables1 (from its American pronunciation)
In writing93 times per million words; the 1,144th most frequent word form
Wrong spellings searchednone measured in search
Pairs people search
Sounds like

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); 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 common is sun?

Sun appears 93 times per million words in written English, the 1,144th 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 sun?

  • /sʌn/
  • /sʊn/

Sun 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-uk-sun.ogg, En-uk-son.ogg, LL-Q1860_(eng)-Persent101-sun.wav, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).

Words people confuse with sun

Word pairs people search, with the monthly searches for “a vs b” (G: Google, B: Bing, United States).

son vs sun110 G

Sounds like: son (Wiktionary's homophone list; some hold only in some accents).

Sources: Google and Bing searches (September 2025 to August 2026, through DataForSEO); English Wiktionary (homophones, alternative spellings).

Forms of sun

  • suns plural, present, singular, he/she/it
  • sunning participle, present
  • sunned participle, past

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

What does sun mean?

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

noun

  1. 1

    A star, especially when seen as the centre of any single solar system.

  2. 2

    The light and heat which are received from the Sun; sunshine or sunlight.

    I have been broiling in the sun all morning.

  3. 3

    Something like the sun in brightness or splendor.

  4. 4

    Sunrise or sunset.

  5. 5

    A revolution of the Earth around the Sun; a year.

  6. 6

    A transversing of the sky by the Sun; a day.

  7. 7

    The nineteenth trump/major arcana card of the tarot.

  8. 8

    The thirty-first Lenormand card.

  9. 9

    A traditional Japanese unit of length, approximately 30.3 millimetres (1.193 inches).

  10. 10

    Alternative form of sunn (“the plant”).

verb

  1. 1

    To expose to the heat and radiation of the sun.

    Beautiful bodies lying on the beach, sunning their bronzed limbs.

  2. 2

    To warm or dry in the sunshine.

  3. 3

    To be exposed to the sun.

  4. 4

    To expose the eyes to the sun as part of the Bates method.

noun

as Sun
  1. 1

    Abbreviation of Sunday.

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

Sun in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese

LanguageWords
Frenchsoleil (a star, especially when seen as the centre of…), dim. (Sunday)
GermanSonne (a star, especially when seen as the centre of…), So., Son., Sonnt. (Sunday)
Portuguesesol (a star, especially when seen as the centre of…), dom (Sunday), nascer/pôr do sol (sunrise or sunset)
Spanishsol (a star, especially when seen as the centre of…), salida del sol, puesta de sol, ocaso (sunrise or sunset), asolear, asolar (to expose to the warmth and radiation of the sun)

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 sun come from?

From Middle English soen, son, sone, sonne, sun, sune, sunna, sunne, sunnæ, synne, zonne, zunne, from Old English sunna, sunne, sunnu (“sun”), from Proto-West Germanic *sunnā, from Proto-Germanic *sunnǭ (“sun”), from heteroclitic inanimate Proto-Indo-European *sh₂wen-, oblique of Proto-Indo-European *sóh₂wl̥ (“sun”).

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

What to look up after sun