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your

Definition, pronunciation, etymology, and usage for the English word. Free spelling reference powered by Wiktionary.

Letters

4 characters

Language

English

word origin

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Detailed reference entry for the English word "your", 4-letters, with pronunciation in International Phonetic Alphabet notation, etymology traced through Germanic and Romance roots where applicable, common misspelling variants catalogued from Hunspell error dictionaries, and usage frequency ranked against the top 100,000 English words in the Wordfreq corpus. PlainSpell covers English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and German spelling with confusable-pair detection that highlights visually and phonetically similar words. This entry for "your" includes synonyms, antonyms, homophones, and cross-language translation pointers sourced from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org extract. Whether you are verifying the correct spelling of "your" for academic writing, checking homophone confusion, or exploring etymological origins, this page provides a citation-backed, free reference that requires no sign-up.

your is aEnglishdet. It means: Belonging to you; of you; related to you (singular; one owner). Pronounced /jɔː(ɹ)/. It ranks #31 in English word frequency. Often confused with yu and yr.

Key facts for your
PropertyValue
Headwordyour
LanguageEnglish
Part of speechDet
IPA/jɔː(ɹ)/
Letters4
Frequency rank#31
Misspellings tracked5
Confusable pairs20
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Frequency rank visualization

Position of your in English word frequency (lower rank = more common)

Source: Wordfreq corpus

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

The English entry for your is 4 letters long, classified as adet, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /jɔː(ɹ)/. Corpus data places it at rank #31 in overall English word frequency, putting it firmly in the everyday core of the language.Wiktionary records 4 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.

Our Hunspell-derived misspelling index lists 5 documented wrong-spelling variants for your, with forms such as "oyur", "yoru", and "yourr". Each variant represents a distinct typo pattern that appears often enough in corpora to be worth flagging, typically a doubled-consonant error, a silent-letter drop, or a vowel substitution.It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "yu", "yr", "yup", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.

Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English your, youre, ȝour, ȝoure, from Old English ēower, īower (“your”, plural), from Proto-West Germanic *iuwar, from Proto-Germanic *izweraz. Cognate with Saterland Frisian jou (“your”), Dutch jouw (“your”), German Low German jo, jos (“your”)… Root origin matters for spelling because borrowed morphemes (Greek, Latin, Old French, Old English) carry their source-language orthographic conventions into modern English, which is why historical etymology is often the cleanest predictor of whether a cluster like "-ough", "-eau", or "-tion" will appear. For readers arriving here from a spelling check, the authoritative guidance is: the correct English form is your, spelled Y-O-U-R, and any other sequence of those letters, regardless of how natural it feels, is a misspelling in standard orthography.

Definition

  1. 1
    Belonging to you; of you; related to you (singular; one owner).
  2. 2
    Belonging to you; of you; related to you (plural; more owners).
  3. 3
    A determiner that conveys familiarity and mutual knowledge of the modified noun.
  4. 4
    That; the specified (usually used with a human referent)

Etymology

From Middle English your, youre, ȝour, ȝoure, from Old English ēower, īower (“your”, plural), from Proto-West Germanic *iuwar, from Proto-Germanic *izweraz. Cognate with Saterland Frisian jou (“your”), Dutch jouw (“your”), German Low German jo, jos (“your”), German euer (“your”, plural), Danish jeres (“your”).

This word in other languages

Common misspellings

Also misspelled as: oyur,yoru,yourr,yuor,yyour

Misspelling Pattern Breakdown

Relative frequency of common misspelling types for your

Misspelling Variants of "your"

oyur4yoru4yourr5yuor4yyour5
Misspelling Variants of "your"

Frequency rank: #31 in English

Frequently Asked Questions

How do you spell "your"?
"your" is spelled Y-O-U-R. The IPA pronunciation is /jɔː(ɹ)/.
What does "your" mean?
As a det, "your" means: Belonging to you; of you; related to you (singular; one owner).
What words are commonly confused with "your"?
"your" is commonly confused with "yu", "yr", "yup". These words look or sound similar but have different meanings. PlainSpell provides detailed comparisons for each pair.
How do you pronounce "your"?
The IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) transcription for "your" is /jɔː(ɹ)/. Click the speaker icon on the pronunciation badge above to hear it spoken aloud where audio is available.
What is the origin of the word "your"?
From Middle English your, youre, ȝour, ȝoure, from Old English ēower, īower (“your”, plural), from Proto-West Germanic *iuwar, from Proto-Germanic *izweraz. Cognate with Saterland Frisian jou (“your”), Dutch jouw (“your”), German Low German jo, jo... See the full etymology section above for more details.
Is PlainSpell free to use?
Yes, PlainSpell is a completely free word reference. You can look up definitions, pronunciations, confusable pairs, homophones, and spelling corrections across 5 languages without any sign-up or subscription.

Nearby English words

Other entries that begin with the letter Y in our English index:

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Data Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org), licensed under CC BY-SA & GFDL. Frequency data from Wordfreq. Misspellings derived from Hunspell dictionaries.