try
Definition, pronunciation, etymology, and usage for the English word. Free spelling reference powered by Wiktionary.
Letters
3 characters
Language
English
word origin
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Detailed reference entry for the English word "try", 3-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 "try" 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 "try" for academic writing, checking homophone confusion, or exploring etymological origins, this page provides a citation-backed, free reference that requires no sign-up.
try is aEnglishverb. It means: To attempt; to endeavour. Followed by infinitive. Pronounced /tɹaɪ/. It ranks #299 in English word frequency. Often confused with TV and TX.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | try |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Verb |
| IPA | /tɹaɪ/ |
| Letters | 3 |
| Frequency rank | #299 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Frequency rank visualization
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for try is 3 letters long, classified as averb, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /tɹaɪ/. Corpus data places it at rank #299 in overall English word frequency, putting it firmly in the everyday core of the language.Wiktionary records 21 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
No frequent misspelling variants are recorded for try in our index, suggesting the orthography either follows predictable English patterns or the word is uncommon enough that typo corpora lack signal.It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "TV", "TX", "Tu", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English trien (“to separate out, sift, choose, select, evaluate, try a legal case”), from Anglo-Norman trier, triher, triere (“to divide, separate, choose, select, prove, determine, try a case”), Old French trier (“to choose, pick out or separat… 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 try, spelled T-R-Y, and any other sequence of those letters, regardless of how natural it feels, is a misspelling in standard orthography.
Definition
- 1To attempt; to endeavour. Followed by infinitive.
- 2To divide; to separate.
- 3To divide; to separate.
- 4To divide; to separate.
- 5To divide; to separate.
- 6To test, to work out.
- 7To test, to work out.
- 8To test, to work out.
- 9To test, to work out.
- 10To test, to work out.
- 11To test, to work out.
- 12To test, to work out.
- 13To test, to work out.
- 14To experiment, to strive.
- 15To experiment, to strive.
- 16To experiment, to strive.
- 17To experiment, to strive.
- 18To experiment, to strive.
- 19To lie to in heavy weather under just sufficient sail to head into the wind.
- 20To strain; to subject to excessive tests.
- 21To want, to desire.
Etymology
From Middle English trien (“to separate out, sift, choose, select, evaluate, try a legal case”), from Anglo-Norman trier, triher, triere (“to divide, separate, choose, select, prove, determine, try a case”), Old French trier (“to choose, pick out or separate from others, sift, cull”), of uncertain origin. Cognate with Occitan triar (“to choose, sort, scrutinise, peel”), Catalan triar (“to pick, choose, decide”). Suggested to be derived from Late Latin *trītāre (“to crush, grind, trample, wear out”), itself derived from Classical Latin trītus (“rubbed, worn down, pulverised”), the past participle of terō, terere (“to rub, wear down, trample”), though this derivation is incompatible with the Occitan form. Additionally, the shift in meaning from "rub, crush, trample" to "pick out, choose, cull" is difficult to explain. One suggestion is that the semantic shift might have originated from a Latin phrase *granum terere ("to tread the corn (in threshing)"; compare Latin trītūra (“rubbing, chafing, friction" also "threshing”)), which has a parallel in the modern French trier le grain (“to sort the grain”). Alternatively, perhaps derived from Vulgar Latin *trīāre, a metathetic alteration of *tīrāre (“to tear off, pull, draw”), whence also Old French tirer (“to draw, pull, pluck, tug, peck at, extract”), Occitan tirar (“to take, draw, retrieve, remove, extract”). Replaced native Middle English cunnen (“to try”) (from Old English cunnian), Middle English fandien (“to try, prove”) (from Old English fandian), and Middle English costnien (“to try, tempt, test”) (from Old English costnian).
This word in other languages
Frequency rank: #299 in English
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Nearby English words
Other entries that begin with the letter T in our English index: