thin blue line
"thin-blue-line" is a 12-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“thin blue line” is uncommon English (outside the top frequency list), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency English
- 14
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - The police.
Corpus desk
Index EN-thin-blue-line · thin blue line · English
thin blue line · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
- LEN-MEGA 14 letters
- VOW-5 5 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-THIN "T" thin
- PHOTO-UNK Peer pending
Read with this headword: Spelling guide for this pattern
Desk codes from Wiktionary headword shape, FrequencyWords rank tier, confusable-pair count, generated misspelling depth, letter-cohort book size, and photo-finish peer. Not a difficulty grade.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | thin blue line |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| Letters | 14 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “thin blue line” in English
Rare enough to double-check
thin blue line is uncommon English outside the top frequency list, classed as anoun. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 2 senses are on record.
Zero misspellings are on record for thin blue line in our index, and the word's spelling is regular enough that our generator found nothing worth flagging. No confusable counterpart is on file for this word, suggesting its spelling stands apart enough that readers rarely confuse it with something else.
Etymologically, the entry records: By analogy with Thin Red Line. “Blue” refers to the color of the uniforms of many police departments. The correct English form is thin blue line, spelled T-H-I-N- -B-L-U-E- -L-I-N-E.
Definition
- 1The police.
- 2A flag or symbol representing the police, commonly associated with the blue lives matter movement.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how thin blue line appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
Crime wave overwhelms thin blue line [title]
It followed dire warnings from the police staff associations that the possible loss of up to 40,000 police jobs would mean “Christmas coming early” for criminals, and the “thin blue line” left too stretched to cope with the inevitable risk of social and industrial unrest.
Etymology
By analogy with Thin Red Line. “Blue” refers to the color of the uniforms of many police departments.
Definitions, pronunciation, and etymology for this entry are drawn from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org structured extract (CC BY-SA). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.