support
Definition, pronunciation, etymology, and usage for the English word. Free spelling reference powered by Wiktionary.
Letters
7 characters
Language
English
word origin
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Detailed reference entry for the English word "support", 7-letters, with pronunciation in International Phonetic Alphabet notation, etymology traced through Germanic and Romance roots where applicable, common misspelling variants catalogued from Hunspell error dictionaries, and usage frequency ranked against the top 100,000 English words in the Wordfreq corpus. PlainSpell covers English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and German spelling with confusable-pair detection that highlights visually and phonetically similar words. This entry for "support" includes synonyms, antonyms, homophones, and cross-language translation pointers sourced from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org extract. Whether you are verifying the correct spelling of "support" for academic writing, checking homophone confusion, or exploring etymological origins, this page provides a citation-backed, free reference that requires no sign-up.
support is aEnglishverb. It means: To help keep from falling. Pronounced /səˈpɔːt/. It ranks #276 in English word frequency. Often confused with suppose and supported.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | support |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Verb |
| IPA | /səˈpɔːt/ |
| Letters | 7 |
| Frequency rank | #276 |
| Misspellings tracked | 9 |
| Confusable pairs | 7 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Frequency rank visualization
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for support is 7 letters long, classified as averb, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /səˈpɔːt/. Corpus data places it at rank #276 in overall English word frequency, putting it firmly in the everyday core of the language.Wiktionary records 11 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our Hunspell-derived misspelling index lists 9 documented wrong-spelling variants for support, with forms such as "spuport", "ssupport", and "supoprt". Each variant represents a distinct typo pattern that appears often enough in corpora to be worth flagging, typically a doubled-consonant error, a silent-letter drop, or a vowel substitution.It also participates in 7 confusable-pair relationships, "suppose", "supported", "supporter", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English supporten, from Old French supporter, from Latin supportō. Root origin matters for spelling because borrowed morphemes (Greek, Latin, Old French, Old English) carry their source-language orthographic conventions into modern English, which is why historical etymology is often the cleanest predictor of whether a cluster like "-ough", "-eau", or "-tion" will appear. For readers arriving here from a spelling check, the authoritative guidance is: the correct English form is support, spelled S-U-P-P-O-R-T, and any other sequence of those letters, regardless of how natural it feels, is a misspelling in standard orthography.
Definition
- 1To help keep from falling.
- 2To back or favor a cause, party, etc., mentally or with concrete aid
- 3To provide sustenance or maintenance for; to sustain in integrity or livelihood.
- 4To help, particularly financially; to subsidize.
- 5To provide evidence for; to lend credibility to.
- 6To serve, as in a customer-oriented position; to give support to.
- 7To assist or be involved with, but not be responsible for.
- 8To answer questions and resolve problems regarding something sold.
- 9To be designed to provide capacity for; to work or be compatible with (a part, accessory, file type, program, algorithm, etc.).
- 10To endure without being overcome; bear; undergo; tolerate.
- 11To play a lesser part in the same production with (a star performer).
Etymology
From Middle English supporten, from Old French supporter, from Latin supportō.
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: spuport,ssupport,supoprt,suport,supporrt,supportt,suppotr,supprot,uspport
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
Relative frequency of common misspelling types for support
Misspelling Variants of "support"
Frequency rank: #276 in English
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Nearby English words
Other entries that begin with the letter S in our English index: