Tsai
"tsai" is a 4-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“Tsai” is a moderately-common English word, ranked #39,620 in English word frequency and used as a proper noun.
- #39,620
- frequency rank, English
- 4
- letters
- 5
- tracked misspellings
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - A surname from Mandarin Chinese.
Visual similarity to commonly confused words
How many letter changes separate each confused pair (Levenshtein distance, normalized).
Source: PlainSpell confusable corpus (Wiktionary, CC BY-SA).
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | Tsai |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Proper noun |
| Letters | 4 |
| Frequency rank | #39,620 |
| Misspellings tracked | 5 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “Tsai” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for Tsai is 4 letters long, classified as a proper noun. Corpus data places it at rank #39,620 in overall English word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it. The dominant gloss from Wiktionary reads: "A surname from Mandarin Chinese.".
Our generated misspelling index lists 5 likely wrong-spelling variants for Tsai, with forms such as "stai", "tasi", and "tsia". Every one of these variants traces to a single-character edit -- an added or dropped letter, a swapped consonant, or a vowel swap -- the kind of slip a spell-checker is built to catch. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "tsk", "tse", "TWA", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Mandarin 蔡 (Cài), Wade–Giles romanization: Tsʻai⁴. The correct English form is Tsai, spelled T-S-A-I.
Definition
- 1A surname from Mandarin Chinese.
Etymology
From Mandarin 蔡 (Cài), Wade–Giles romanization: Tsʻai⁴.
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: stai,tasi,tsia,tssai,ttsai
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of Tsai - counted as single-character edits (an insertion, a deletion, or a substituted letter). The larger the bar, the easier the typo is to spot; one-edit slips are the ones that sneak past readers.
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 “Tsai”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is T-S-A-I - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Don't mix it up with “tsk” - see the side-by-side comparison. Tsai vs tsk
- Browse more English words and confusable pairs in the same reference. English words
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.