war
/wɔɹ/noun, verb
war is spelled W-A-R: 3 letters and one syllable. It appears 288 times per million words in written English, the 329th most frequent word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). As a noun, war means “Organized, large-scale, armed conflict between countries or between national, ethnic, or other sizeable groups, usually but not always involving…” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). The plural of war is wars.
How many letters and syllables are in war?
| Letters | 3: W-A-R |
|---|---|
| Syllables | 1 (from its American pronunciation) |
| In writing | 288 times per million words; the 329th most frequent word form |
| Wrong spellings searched | none measured in search |
| Pairs people search | |
| Sounds like | |
| Rhymes with | |
| 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 war?
War appears 288 times per million words in written English, the 329th 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 war?
- UK /wɔː/
- US /wɔɹ/
- US /woɹ/
War 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-war.ogg, En-us-war.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Words people confuse with war
Word pairs people search, with the monthly searches for “a vs b” (G: Google, B: Bing, United States).
Sounds like: waw, wor, wore (Wiktionary's homophone list; some hold only in some accents).
Sources: Google and Bing searches (September 2025 to August 2026, through DataForSEO); English Wiktionary (homophones, alternative spellings).
What rhymes with war?
The 12 most written words on PlainSpell end in the same sounds as war from its last stressed vowel (/ɔɹ/):
Spelled with the same letters in another order: raw.
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 war
- wars plural, present, singular, he/she/it
- warring participle, present
- warred participle, past
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
What does war mean?
The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).
noun
- 1
Organized, large-scale, armed conflict between countries or between national, ethnic, or other sizeable groups, usually but not always involving active engagement of military forces.
holy war; just war; civil war
- 2
A particular conflict of this kind.
A second challenge will be to implement, with our allies, a plan of stability in the Balkans, so that the region's bitter ethnic problems can no longer be exploited by dictators and Americans do not have to cross the Atlantic again to fight
- 3
proscribedProtracted armed conflict against irregular forces, particularly groups considered terrorists.
Our war on terror begins with al Qaeda, but it does not end there. It will not end until every terrorist group of global reach has been found, stopped and defeated.
- 4
proscribedProtracted state or state-sponsored political violence against dissidents.
the Dirty War...
- 5
Any protracted conflict, particularly
- 6
USA sustained campaign against a social problem, idea, set of values, etc.
- 7
A protracted instance of fierce competition in trade.
price wars... Cola Wars... format wars...
- 8
A protracted struggle between rival organizations for control of a particular institution.
FISA–FOCA war...
verb
- 1
To engage in conflict (may be followed by "with" to specify the foe).
And they warred against the Midianites, as the Lord commanded Moses, and they slew all the males
- 2
To carry on, as a contest; to wage.
noun
- 1
Initialism of write after read, a kind of data hazard.
- 2
Acronym of wins above replacement.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
War in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
| Language | Words |
|---|---|
| French | guerre , bataille , entrer en guerre, faire la guerre |
| German | Krieg , Krieg führen, kriegen |
| Portuguese | guerra , guerrear |
| Spanish | guerra, guerrero, bélico, belicoso, pugnaz , guerrear |
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.