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PlainSpell

tele

/ˈtɛli/noun

tele is a noun meaning “Alternative spelling of telly (“television, telegraph, telephone, teleport, telecommunication”)” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). It is spelled T-E-L-E and has 2 syllables, and it appears 1.3 times per million words in written English (wordfreq, 2021 data). The plural of tele is teles.

What does tele mean?

noun

  1. 1

    rareAlternative spelling of telly (“television, telegraph, telephone, teleport, telecommunication”).

  2. 2

    According to Jacob L. Moreno, a mutual connection or rapport between people that is not a mere one-way process like empathy or transference.

noun

as Tele
  1. 1

    informalA Fender Telecaster electric guitar.

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

How do you pronounce tele?

  • /ˈtɛli/

Tele has 2 syllables (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: LL-Q1860_(eng)-Vealhurl-tele-.wav, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).

Forms of tele

  • teles plural

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

How common is tele?

Tele appears 1.3 times per million words in written English, the 24,463rd 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).

Words people confuse with tele

Also written: telly.

Sources: English Wiktionary (homophones, alternative spellings).

Tele in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese

In the sense over a distance:

LanguageWords
Frenchtélé-
Germanfern-
Portuguesetele-
Spanishtele-

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 tele come from?

Clipping of words starting with tele-.

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