wishful thinking
"wishful-thinking" is a 15-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“wishful thinking” is uncommon English (outside the top frequency list), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- Unranked
- below top-frequency English
- 16
- letters
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - The formation of beliefs based on an outcome that aligns with one's desires or hopes, while disregarding evidence, rationality, or reality.
Corpus desk
Index EN-wishful-thinking · wishful thinking · English
wishful thinking · unranked · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-UNRANKED Unranked
- LEN-MEGA 16 letters
- VOW-4 4 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-THIN "W" thin
- PHOTO-UNK Peer pending
Read with this headword: Spelling guide for this pattern
Desk codes from Wiktionary headword shape, FrequencyWords rank tier, confusable-pair count, generated misspelling depth, letter-cohort book size, and photo-finish peer. Not a difficulty grade.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | wishful thinking |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| Letters | 16 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “wishful thinking” in English
Rare enough to double-check
wishful thinking is uncommon English outside the top frequency list, classed as anoun. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 2 senses are on record.
wishful thinking has no tracked misspelling variants, and the word's spelling is regular enough that our generator found nothing worth flagging. It is not paired with a close-neighbour confusable in our dataset, which usually means its spelling is distinct enough that readers don't reach for a similar-looking word instead.
No borrowing history is documented for this entry, so its spelling is best read as a straightforward mapping from sound to letter. The correct English form is wishful thinking, spelled W-I-S-H-F-U-L- -T-H-I-N-K-I-N-G.
Definition
- 1The formation of beliefs based on an outcome that aligns with one's desires or hopes, while disregarding evidence, rationality, or reality.
- 2Decision making based on self-delusion.
Recorded use
Wiktionary examplesThese source excerpts show how wishful thinking appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
When you first come out, you might have an overactive gaydar. When I realized I was gay, I wanted everyone to be gay too, which led to a lot of wishful thinking. "Helen Hunt is gay!" Dream on, girl!
Although no word has ever really emerged of what the Queen has really thought of her prime ministers, there has always been a sense that she did not get on terribly well with Thatcher. Some of this is doubtless wishful thinking, but there were sufficient straws in the wind to give it some credence, such as the story that the prime minister asked what the…
This word in other languages
Definitions, pronunciation, and etymology for this entry are drawn from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org structured extract (CC BY-SA). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.