wok
/wɒk/
"wok" is a 3-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“wok” sits in 20 confusable pairs (corpus #37,773) as a noun. The look-alike neighbours are the real trap.
- #37,773
- frequency rank, English
- 1,759
- “W” headwords
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - A large, round-bottomed cooking pan used in East Asian cooking.
Corpus desk
Index EN-wok · wok · English
wok · rank #37,773 · 0 variants · 20 confusables
- FREQ-MID #37,773
- LEN-MID 3 letters
- VOW-1 1 vowel
- CONFUS-HIGH 20 pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-MID 1,759
- PHOTO-FINISH witcher
Nearest frequency peer: witcher (-1 rank slots)
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.
Frequency neighbours of confusable “wok”
Peers at similar corpus weight, separate from look-alike pairs below
- windward
windward
62,231 corpus weight
- witcher
witcher
62,229 corpus weight
- wok
wok
62,228 corpus weight
- woodcock
woodcock
62,227 corpus weight
- Xiang
Xiang
62,226 corpus weight
- Yahya
Yahya
62,224 corpus weight
What this shows Bars place “wok” against nearest ranked English headwords, not a reprint of the confusable-pair desk.
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 | wok |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /wɒk/ |
| Letters | 3 |
| Frequency rank | #37,773 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Corpus rank beside confusables of “wok”
Easy to mix with look-alikes
The spelling risk for wok is neighbouring look-alikes ("Wu", "wt", …), not just typos; it is anoun pronounced /wɒk/. Frequency #37,773 among 1,759 “W” headwords. 2 recorded senses keep meaning in play.
wok doesn't appear in our generated misspelling index, which points to an orthography that plays by predictable English rules. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "Wu", "wt", "WS", and more, a pairing that trips writers up because the two words share enough sound or shape to blur together.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Cantonese 鑊 /镬 (wok⁶). The correct English form is wok, spelled W-O-K.
Definition
- 1A large, round-bottomed cooking pan used in East Asian cooking.
- 2Any dish prepared using such a pan.
Recorded use
Wiktionary exampleThese source excerpts show how wok appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
The 'wok' is an efficient, all-purpose metal cooking vessel used by every housewife in China. It has two handles and is shaped like a shallow cone.
Etymology
From Cantonese 鑊 /镬 (wok⁶).
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); 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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Similar English words by spelling shape
Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "wok", not the corpus desk frequency band.
Same letter count
Frequency-ranked English headwords with 3 letters (nearest by frequency rank).