karate
[kaˈɾat̪e]
The verdict
“karate” is a moderately-common Spanish word, ranked #20,105 in Spanish word frequency and used as a noun.
- #20,105
- frequency rank, Spanish
- 6
- letters
- 8
- tracked misspellings
- 4
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - Arte marcial de origen japonés, desarrollado a comienzos del siglo XX a partir de estilos okinawenses más antiguos, hoy practicada como deporte y medio de autodefensa en todo el mundo. Es un arte c...
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 | karate |
| Language | Spanish |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | [kaˈɾat̪e] |
| Letters | 6 |
| Frequency rank | #20,105 |
| Misspellings tracked | 8 |
| Confusable pairs | 4 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “karate” sits in Spanish frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The Spanish entry for karate is 6 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as [kaˈɾat̪e]. Corpus data places it at rank #20,105 in overall Spanish word frequency, marking it as uncommon enough that many writers pause before typing it. The dominant gloss from Wiktionary reads: "Arte marcial de origen japonés, desarrollado a comienzos del siglo XX a partir de estilos okinawenses más antiguos, hoy practicada como deporte y medio de autodefensa en todo el mundo. Es un arte c...".
Our generated misspelling index lists 8 likely wrong-spelling variants for karate, with forms such as "akrate", "kaarte", and "karaet". Each of these forms differs from the correct spelling by one small edit: a doubled letter, a dropped silent letter, or a substituted vowel. It also participates in 4 confusable-pair relationships, "Kate", "kart", "kara", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
No borrowing history is documented for this entry, leaving phoneme-to-grapheme mapping as the best guide to its spelling rather than a borrowing history. The correct Spanish form is karate, spelled K-A-R-A-T-E.
Definition
- 1Arte marcial de origen japonés, desarrollado a comienzos del siglo XX a partir de estilos okinawenses más antiguos, hoy practicada como deporte y medio de autodefensa en todo el mundo. Es un arte característicamente externo, empleando golpes de puño y pie, posturas más o menos rígidas y bloqueos.
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: akrate,kaarte,karaet,karatte,karrate,kartae,kkarate,kraate
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of karate - counted as single-character edits (an insertion, a deletion, or a substituted letter). The larger the bar, the easier the typo is to spot; one-edit slips are the ones that sneak past readers.
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 Spanish corpus, MIT). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.
Frequently Asked Questions
How do you spell "karate"?
What does "karate" mean?
What words are commonly confused with "karate"?
How do you pronounce "karate"?
What language does "karate" come from?
Is PlainSpell free to use?
Using “karate”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct Spanish spelling is K-A-R-A-T-E - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as [kaˈɾat̪e] (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “Kate” - see the side-by-side comparison. karate vs Kate
- Browse more Spanish words and confusable pairs in the same reference. Spanish 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.