swing
Definition, pronunciation, etymology, and usage for the English word. Free spelling reference powered by Wiktionary.
Letters
5 characters
Language
English
word origin
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Detailed reference entry for the English word "swing", 5-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 "swing" 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 "swing" for academic writing, checking homophone confusion, or exploring etymological origins, this page provides a citation-backed, free reference that requires no sign-up.
swing is aEnglishverb. It means: To rotate about an off-centre fixed point. Pronounced /ˈswɪŋ/. It ranks #4,051 in English word frequency. Often confused with Swiss and swipe.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | swing |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Verb |
| IPA | /ˈswɪŋ/ |
| Letters | 5 |
| Frequency rank | #4,051 |
| Misspellings tracked | 8 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Frequency rank visualization
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for swing is 5 letters long, classified as averb, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /ˈswɪŋ/. Corpus data places it at rank #4,051 in overall English word frequency, indicating it appears regularly in written and spoken text.Wiktionary records 19 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our Hunspell-derived misspelling index lists 8 documented wrong-spelling variants for swing, with forms such as "siwng", "sswing", and "swign". 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 20 confusable-pair relationships, "Swiss", "swipe", "swung", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English swyngen, from Old English swingan, from Proto-West Germanic *swingan, from Proto-Germanic *swinganą (compare Low German swingen, German schwingen, Dutch zwingen, Swedish svinga), from Proto-Indo-European *swenk-, *sweng- (compare Scottis… 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 swing, spelled S-W-I-N-G, and any other sequence of those letters, regardless of how natural it feels, is a misspelling in standard orthography.
Definition
- 1To rotate about an off-centre fixed point.
- 2To dance.
- 3To ride on a swing.
- 4To participate in the swinging lifestyle; to participate in wifeswapping.
- 5To hang from the gallows; to be punished by hanging, swing for something or someone; (often hyperbolic) to be severely punished.
- 6To move sideways in its trajectory.
- 7(of a bowler) To make the ball move sideways in its trajectory.
- 8To fluctuate or change.
- 9To move (an object) backward and forward; to wave.
- 10To change (a numerical result); especially to change the outcome of an election.
- 11To make (something) work; especially to afford (something) financially.
- 12To play notes that are in pairs by making the first of the pair slightly longer than written (augmentation) and the second shorter, resulting in a bouncy, uneven rhythm.
- 13To move one's arm in a punching motion.
- 14In dancing, to turn around in a small circle with one's partner, holding hands or arms.
- 15To admit or turn something for the purpose of shaping it; said of a lathe.
- 16To put (a door, gate, etc.) on hinges so that it can swing or turn.
- 17To turn round by action of wind or tide when at anchor.
- 18To turn in a different direction.
- 19To be sexually oriented.
Etymology
From Middle English swyngen, from Old English swingan, from Proto-West Germanic *swingan, from Proto-Germanic *swinganą (compare Low German swingen, German schwingen, Dutch zwingen, Swedish svinga), from Proto-Indo-European *swenk-, *sweng- (compare Scottish Gaelic seang (“thin”)). Related to swink.
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: siwng,sswing,swign,swingg,swinng,swnig,swwing,wsing
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
Relative frequency of common misspelling types for swing
Misspelling Variants of "swing"
Frequency rank: #4,051 in English
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Nearby English words
Other entries that begin with the letter S in our English index: