young
/jʌŋ/
"young" is a 5-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“young” is in the everyday core of English, ranked #364 in English word frequency and used as an adjective.
- #364
- frequency rank, English
- 5
- letters
- 7
- tracked misspellings
- 18
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - In the early part of growth or life; born not long ago.
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 | young |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Adjective |
| IPA | /jʌŋ/ |
| Letters | 5 |
| Frequency rank | #364 |
| Misspellings tracked | 7 |
| Confusable pairs | 18 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “young” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for young is 5 letters long, classified as an adjective, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /jʌŋ/. Corpus data places it at rank #364 in overall English word frequency, putting it firmly in the everyday core of the language. Wiktionary records 8 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
Our generated misspelling index lists 7 likely wrong-spelling variants for young, with forms such as "oyung", "yonug", and "yougn". 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 18 confusable-pair relationships, "Yun", "your", "yous", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Etymologically, the entry records: Inherited from Middle English yong, yonge, from Old English ġeong, from Proto-West Germanic *jung, from Proto-Germanic *jungaz, from Proto-Indo-European *h₂yuHn̥ḱós, from *h₂yuh₁en- (“young”). Cognates Cognate with Alemannic German jung, jungu, junhs, jungà… The correct English form is young, spelled Y-O-U-N-G.
Definition
- 1In the early part of growth or life; born not long ago.
- 2At an early stage of existence or development; having recently come into existence.
- 3advanced in age; (far towards or) at a specified stage of existence or age.
- 4Junior (of two related people with the same name).
- 5Early. (of a decade of life)
- 6Youthful; having the look or qualities of a young person.
- 7Of or belonging to the early part of life.
- 8Having little experience; inexperienced; unpracticed; ignorant; weak.
Etymology
Inherited from Middle English yong, yonge, from Old English ġeong, from Proto-West Germanic *jung, from Proto-Germanic *jungaz, from Proto-Indo-European *h₂yuHn̥ḱós, from *h₂yuh₁en- (“young”). Cognates Cognate with Alemannic German jung, jungu, junhs, jungà, jòng (“young”), Bavarian junk (“young”), Central Franconian, Luxembourgish jonk (“young”), Cimbrian djung, jung, junk (“young”), Dutch jong (“young”), German, German Low German, Mòcheno and Vilamovian jung (“young”), Limburgish jong, jonk (“young”), Yiddish יונג (yung, “young”), Danish, Norwegian Bokmål, Norwegian Nynorsk and Swedish ung (“young”), Faroese, Icelandic ungur (“young”), Gothic 𐌾𐌿𐌲𐌲𐍃 (juggs, “young”).
Synonyms
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: oyung,yonug,yougn,youngg,younng,yuong,yyoung
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of young - measured in single-character edits (insert, delete, or substitute a letter). Larger bars are easier to catch; one-edit slips are the sneakiest.
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 “young”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is Y-O-U-N-G - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /jʌŋ/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “Yun” - see the side-by-side comparison. young vs Yun
- 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.