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PlainSpell

wall

UK /wɔːl/noun, verb, interjection

wall is spelled W-A-L-L: 4 letters and one syllable. It appears 110 times per million words in written English, the 972nd most frequent word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). As a noun, wall means “A rampart of earth, stones etc. built up for defensive purposes” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). The plural of wall is walls.

How many letters and syllables are in wall?

Letters4: W-A-L-L
Syllables1 (from its American pronunciation)
In writing110 times per million words; the 972nd most frequent word form
Wrong spellings searchednone measured in search
Rhymes with

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); rhymes and same-letter words are computed by PlainSpell from its own word list.

How common is wall?

Wall appears 110 times per million words in written English, the 972nd 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 wall?

  • UK /wɔːl/
  • British /woːl/
  • /wɔl/

Wall 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-wall.ogg, En-us-wall.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).

Words people confuse with wall

Also written: well.

Sources: English Wiktionary (homophones, alternative spellings).

What rhymes with wall?

The 12 most written words on PlainSpell end in the same sounds as wall from its last stressed vowel (/ɔl/, British pronunciation):

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 wall

  • walls plural, present, singular, he/she/it
  • walling participle, present
  • walled participle, past

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

What does wall mean?

The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).

noun

  1. 1

    A rampart of earth, stones etc. built up for defensive purposes.

  2. 2

    A structure built for defense surrounding a city, castle etc.

    The town wall was surrounded by a moat.

  3. 3

    Each of the substantial structures acting either as the exterior of or divisions within a structure.

    We're adding another wall in this room during the remodeling.  The wind blew against the walls of the tent.

  4. 4

    A point of desperation.

  5. 5

    A point of defeat or extinction.

  6. 6

    An impediment to free movement.

    A wall of police officers met the protesters before they reached the capitol steps.

  7. 7

    The butterfly Lasiommata megera.

  8. 8

    A barrier.

    a seawall; a firewall

  9. 9

    A spring of water.

  10. 10

    A kind of knot often used at the end of a rope; a wall knot or wale.

verb

  1. 1

    To enclose with, or as if with, a wall or walls.

    He walled the study with books.

  2. 2

    slangTo use a wallhack.

  3. 3

    slangTo wallbang.

    I walled her. She's low [health].

  4. 4

    To boil.

  5. 5

    To well, as water; spring.

  6. 6

    To make a wall knot on the end of (a rope).

interjection

  1. 1

    USPronunciation spelling of well.

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

Wall in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese

LanguageWords
Frenchmur (defensive rampart), murs, remparts (structure built for defense surrounding an area), paroi, cloison (substantial structure acting as side or…), emmurer (to enclose by surrounding with walls)
GermanWall (defensive rampart), Mauer, Muur (structure built for defense surrounding an area), Wand (substantial structure acting as side or…), einmauern, vermauern (to enclose by surrounding with walls)
Portuguesemuro, muralha (defensive rampart), valo, baluarte (structure built for defense surrounding an area), murar, amurar (to enclose by surrounding with walls)
Spanishmuro, muralla, pared (defensive rampart), murallón (structure built for defense surrounding an area), amurallar, murar (to enclose by surrounding with walls)

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 wall come from?

From Middle English wal, from Old English weall (“wall, dike, earthwork, rampart, dam, rocky shore, cliff”), from Proto-West Germanic *wall (“wall, rampart, entrenchment”), from Latin vallum (“wall, rampart, entrenchment, palisade”), from Proto-Indo-European *welH- (“to turn, wind, roll”). Perhaps conflated with waw (“a wall within a house or dwelling, a room partition”), from Middle English wawe, from Old English wāg, wāh (“an interior wall, divider”), see waw.

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

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