suspend
Definition, pronunciation, etymology, and usage for the English word. Free spelling reference powered by Wiktionary.
Letters
7 characters
Language
English
word origin
Source
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Detailed reference entry for the English word "suspend", 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 "suspend" 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 "suspend" for academic writing, checking homophone confusion, or exploring etymological origins, this page provides a citation-backed, free reference that requires no sign-up.
suspend is aEnglishverb. It means: To halt something temporarily. Pronounced /səsˈpɛnd/. Often confused with suspense and suspended.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | suspend |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Verb |
| IPA | /səsˈpɛnd/ |
| Letters | 7 |
| Frequency rank | #11,619 |
| Misspellings tracked | 11 |
| Confusable pairs | 5 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Frequency rank visualization
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for suspend is 7 letters long, classified as averb, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /səsˈpɛnd/. Corpus data places it at rank #11,619 in overall English word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it.Wiktionary records 9 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our Hunspell-derived misspelling index lists 11 documented wrong-spelling variants for suspend, with forms such as "ssupend", "ssuspend", and "supsend". 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 5 confusable-pair relationships, "suspense", "suspended", "spend", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Old French sospendre, from Latin suspendere. 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 suspend, spelled S-U-S-P-E-N-D, and any other sequence of those letters, regardless of how natural it feels, is a misspelling in standard orthography.
Definition
- 1To halt something temporarily.
- 2To hold in an undetermined or undecided state.
- 3To discontinue or interrupt a function, task, position, or event.
- 4To hang freely; underhang.
- 5To bring a solid substance, usually in powder form, into suspension in a liquid.
- 6To make to depend.
- 7To debar, or cause to withdraw temporarily, from any privilege, from the execution of an office, from the enjoyment of income, etc.
- 8To support in a liquid, as an insoluble powder, by stirring, to facilitate chemical action.
- 9To remove the value of an unused coupon from an air ticket, typically so as to allow continuation of the next sectors' travel.
Etymology
From Old French sospendre, from Latin suspendere.
Antonyms
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: ssupend,ssuspend,supsend,susepnd,suspedn,suspendd,suspennd,suspned,susppend,susspend,usspend
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
Relative frequency of common misspelling types for suspend
Misspelling Variants of "suspend"
Frequency rank: #11,619 in English
Frequently Asked Questions
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Nearby English words
Other entries that begin with the letter S in our English index: