waylaid
/ˌweɪˈleɪd/
"waylaid" is a 7-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“waylaid” is uncommon English (frequency #77,333 among 12,113 “W” headwords), classed as a verb. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- #77,333
- frequency rank, English
- 12,113
- “W” headwords
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - simple past and past participle of waylay
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | waylaid |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Verb |
| IPA | /ˌweɪˈleɪd/ |
| Letters | 7 |
| Frequency rank | #77,333 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “waylaid” sits in English frequency
Rare enough to double-check
waylaid is uncommon English at frequency #77,333 among 12,113 “W” headwords, classed as averb, transcribed /ˌweɪˈleɪd/. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "simple past and past participle of waylay".
We couldn't generate a plausible misspelling set for waylaid, which points to an orthography that plays by predictable English rules. This headword has no recorded confusable partner, since nothing in our dataset looks or sounds close enough to cause mix-ups.
Wiktionary doesn't record an etymology for this headword, so any spelling logic here comes from how the word's sounds map to letters, not a documented origin story. The correct English form is waylaid, spelled W-A-Y-L-A-I-D.
Definition
- 1simple past and past participle of waylay
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 “waylaid”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is W-A-Y-L-A-I-D - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /ˌweɪˈleɪd/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Browse more English words and confusable pairs in the same reference. English words
Other uncommon English words near this rank
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.