thee
/ðiː/verb, noun
thee is spelled T-H-E-E: 4 letters and one syllable. It appears 11 times per million words in written English, the 6,674th most frequent word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). People search “the vs thee” about 720 times a month (Google, United States). As a verb, thee means “To address (a person) using the pronoun thee” (English Wiktionary, September 2026).
How many letters and syllables are in thee?
| Letters | 4: T-H-E-E |
|---|---|
| Syllables | 1 (from its American pronunciation) |
| In writing | 11 times per million words; the 6,674th most frequent word form |
| Wrong spellings searched | none measured in search |
| Pairs people search | |
| Same letters |
Sources: letters and syllables from the English Wiktionary's hyphenation or pronunciation and the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary; written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media); Bing searches in the United States: the average month from September 2025 to August 2026 (Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, read September 30, 2026); rhymes and same-letter words are computed by PlainSpell from its own word list.
How common is thee?
Thee appears 11 times per million words in written English, the 6,674th 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).
How do you pronounce thee?
- /ðiː/
As a verb (“To thrive; prosper”): /θiː/.
Thee has one syllable (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: En-uk-the-stressed.ogg, En-us-the-stressed.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Words people confuse with thee
Word pairs people search, with the monthly searches for “a vs b” (G: Google, B: Bing, United States).
Also written: the.
Sources: Google and Bing searches (September 2025 to August 2026, through DataForSEO); English Wiktionary (homophones, alternative spellings).
What rhymes with thee?
No other word on PlainSpell ends in the same sounds as thee.
Spelled with the same letters in another order: ethe.
Computed by PlainSpell from the pronunciations in the English Wiktionary (dump of September 2, 2026): a rhyme shares every sound from the last stressed vowel to the end; ordered by written frequency (wordfreq 3.1).
Forms of thee
- thou
- thyself
- thees present, singular, he/she/it, plural
- theeing participle, present
- theed participle, past
- the
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
What does thee mean?
The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).
verb
- 1
To address (a person) using the pronoun thee.
- 2
To use the word thee.
- 3
UKobsoleteTo thrive; prosper.
noun
- 1
The letter ⟨(⟩, which stands for the th sound /ð/ in Pitman shorthand.
pronoun
- 1
Honorific alternative letter-case form of thee, sometimes used when referring to God or another important figure who is understood from context.
pronoun
- 1
archaicObjective and reflexive case of thou.
- 2
archaicThou.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Thee in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
In the sense Objective case of 'thou':
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 thee come from?
From Middle English þe, from Old English þē (“thee”, originally dative, but later also accusative, supplanting accusative þec), from Proto-Germanic *þiz (“thee”), from Proto-Indo-European *te (“second-person singular pronoun”). Cognate with Saterland Frisian die (“thee”), West Frisian dy (“thee”), German Low German di (“thee”), German dir (“thee”, dative pron.), Icelandic þér (“thee”). More at thou.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).