surreptitious
/ˌsʌɹɪpˈtɪʃəs/
"surreptitious" is a 13-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“surreptitious” is uncommon English (frequency #68,675 among 6,566 “S” headwords), classed as an adjective. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- #68,675
- frequency rank, English
- 6,566
- “S” headwords
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Stealthy, furtive, well hidden, covert (especially movements).
Corpus desk
Index EN-surreptitious · surreptitious · English
surreptitious · rank #68,675 · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-RARE #68,675
- LEN-MEGA 13 letters
- VOW-6 6 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-DENSE 6,566
- PHOTO-FINISH superyacht
Nearest frequency peer: superyacht (-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 “surreptitious”
Sparse band: bars invert rank so rarer forms read shorter
- summoner
summoner
31,330 corpus weight
- suntan
suntan
31,328 corpus weight
- superyacht
superyacht
31,327 corpus weight
- surreptitio…
surreptitious
31,326 corpus weight
- swirly
swirly
31,325 corpus weight
- Szechuan
Szechuan
31,323 corpus weight
What this shows Long-tail view: where “surreptitious” sits against similarly uncommon English ranks.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | surreptitious |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Adjective |
| IPA | /ˌsʌɹɪpˈtɪʃəs/ |
| Letters | 13 |
| Frequency rank | #68,675 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “surreptitious” in English
Rare enough to double-check
surreptitious is uncommon English at frequency #68,675 among 6,566 “S” headwords, classed as anadjective, transcribed /ˌsʌɹɪpˈtɪʃəs/. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "Stealthy, furtive, well hidden, covert (especially movements).".
Zero misspellings are on record for surreptitious in our index, typically a sign the spelling maps closely to how the word sounds. Our dataset records no confusable match here, since its spelling is unusual enough that it doesn't cluster with a lookalike.
Etymologically, the entry records: Borrowed from Latin surrēptīcius (“furtive, clandestine”), from surrēpō (“to creep along”). The correct English form is surreptitious, spelled S-U-R-R-E-P-T-I-T-I-O-U-S.
Definition
- 1Stealthy, furtive, well hidden, covert (especially movements).
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how surreptitious appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
He read the letter aloud. Sophia listened with the studied air of one for whom, even in these days, a title possessed some surreptitious allurement.
It is also worth noting the case law on prisoners' correspondence which establishes that interception of a person's communications need not be surreptitious in order to amount to an interference with respect to Art 8 (1) [ECHR].
Etymology
Borrowed from Latin surrēptīcius (“furtive, clandestine”), from surrēpō (“to creep along”).
Synonyms
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 "surreptitious", not the corpus desk frequency band.
Same letter count
Frequency-ranked English headwords with 13 letters (nearest by frequency rank).