wide
/waɪd/
"wide" is a 4-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“wide” is a regularly-used English word, ranked #1,177 in English word frequency and used as an adjective.
- #1,177
- frequency rank, English
- 4
- letters
- 5
- tracked misspellings
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - Having a large physical extent from side to side.
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 | wide |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Adjective |
| IPA | /waɪd/ |
| Letters | 4 |
| Frequency rank | #1,177 |
| Misspellings tracked | 5 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “wide” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for wide is 4 letters long, classified as an adjective, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /waɪd/. Corpus data places it at rank #1,177 in overall English word frequency, indicating it appears regularly in written and spoken text. Wiktionary records 11 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our generated misspelling index lists 5 likely wrong-spelling variants for wide, with forms such as "iwde", "wdie", and "widde". 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, "win", "WWE", "wit", and more, since the words sound or look close enough that writers reach for the wrong one mid-sentence.
Etymologically, the entry records: PIE word *dwóh₁ From Middle English wid, wyd, from Old English wīd (“wide, vast, broad, long; distant, far”), from Proto-Germanic *wīdaz, from Proto-Indo-European *h₁weydʰh₁- (“to divide, separate”), a dissimilated univerbation from *dwi- (“apart, asunder,… The correct English form is wide, spelled W-I-D-E.
Definition
- 1Having a large physical extent from side to side.
- 2Large in scope.
- 3Overweight, obese.
- 4Operating at the side of the playing area.
- 5On one side or the other of the mark; too far sideways from the mark, the wicket, the batsman, etc.
- 6Made, as a vowel, with a less tense, and more open and relaxed, condition of the organs in the mouth.
- 7Vast, great in extent, extensive.
- 8Located some distance away; distant, far.
- 9Far from truth, propriety, necessity, etc.
- 10Of or supporting a greater range of text characters than can fit into the traditional 8-bit representation.
- 11Sharp-witted.
Etymology
PIE word *dwóh₁ From Middle English wid, wyd, from Old English wīd (“wide, vast, broad, long; distant, far”), from Proto-Germanic *wīdaz, from Proto-Indo-European *h₁weydʰh₁- (“to divide, separate”), a dissimilated univerbation from *dwi- (“apart, asunder, in two”) + *dʰeh₁- (“to do, put, place”). Cognates Cognate with North Frisian widj (“wide”), Saterland Frisian wied (“wide”), West Frisian wiid (“broad; wide”), Central Franconian weck, weit, wick, wiet (“distant, far, wide”), Dutch wijd (“wide; large; broad”), German weit (“far; wide; broad”), Luxembourgish weit (“wide”), wäit (“far”), Yiddish ווײַט (vayt, “distant, far”), Danish, Norwegian Bokmål, Norwegian Nynorsk, and Swedish vid (“wide”), Faroese and Icelandic víður (“wide”); also Breton gwez (“trees”), Cornish gwedh, gwëdh, gwydh, gwÿdh (“trees”), Irish and Scottish Gaelic fiodh (“timber, wood”), Manx fuygh (“timber, wood”), Welsh gwŷdd (“trees”), Latin dīvidō (“to divide, separate”), Latgalian vyds (“middle”), Latvian vidus (“center, middle”), Lithuanian vidùs (“interior, inside; inward”), Tocharian A and Tocharian B wätk- (“to distinguish, separate”). Related to widow.
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: iwde,wdie,widde,wied,wwide
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of wide - expressed in single-character edits (insert, delete, or swap one letter). Bigger bars stand out at a glance; a one-edit slip is the hardest to catch.
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 “wide”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is W-I-D-E - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /waɪd/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “win” - see the side-by-side comparison. wide vs win
- 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.