tengu
"tengu" is a 5-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“tengu” is uncommon English (frequency #76,392 among 27,828 “T” headwords), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- #76,392
- frequency rank, English
- 27,828
- “T” headwords
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - A mythical Japanese creature, typically birdlike and having a long nose.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | tengu |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| Letters | 5 |
| Frequency rank | #76,392 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “tengu” sits in English frequency
Rare enough to double-check
tengu is uncommon English at frequency #76,392 among 27,828 “T” headwords, classed as anoun. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "A mythical Japanese creature, typically birdlike and having a long nose.".
Zero misspellings are on record for tengu in our index, suggesting the orthography follows predictable English patterns. No close-neighbour confusable shows up for this headword in our dataset, suggesting its spelling stands apart enough that readers rarely confuse it with something else.
Etymologically, the entry records: Borrowed from Japanese 天狗. The correct English form is tengu, spelled T-E-N-G-U.
Definition
- 1A mythical Japanese creature, typically birdlike and having a long nose.
Etymology
Borrowed from Japanese 天狗.
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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Using “tengu”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is T-E-N-G-U - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Browse more English words and confusable pairs in the same reference. English words
Other uncommon English words near this rank
Data Source
Wiktionary (via kaikki.org), licensed under CC BY-SA & GFDL. Word ordering uses an open word-frequency list; misspelling variants are generated by edit-distance from the correct headword.