abaya

\a.ba.ja\

/\a.ba.ja\/ noun

The verdict

“abaya” is uncommon French (frequency #89,346 among 6,727 “A” headwords), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.

#89,346
frequency rank, French
6,727
“A” headwords

According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - Longue robe couvrante portée par certaines femmes du Moyen-Orient et des pays du Maghreb.

Corpus desk

Index FR-abaya · abaya · French

abaya · rank #89,346 · 0 variants · 0 confusables

  • FREQ-RARE #89,346
  • LEN-MID 5 letters
  • VOW-4 4 vowels
  • CONFUS-0 No pairs
  • VAR-0 0 variants
  • BOOK-DENSE 6,727
  • PHOTO-FINISH 7th

Nearest frequency peer: 7th (-1 rank slots)

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.

Rangs de longue queue près de « abaya »

Bande clairsemée: les barres inversent le rang pour que le rare se lise plus court

corpus weight

What this shows Vue de longue queue: où « abaya » se situe face à des rangs français aussi rares.

Source FrequencyWords open word-frequency list As of September 3, 2026
Key facts for abaya
PropertyValue
Headwordabaya
LanguageFrench
Part of speechNoun
IPA\a.ba.ja\
Letters5
Frequency rank#89,346
Misspellings tracked0
Confusable pairs0
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Longue queue: rang de « abaya » en français

De gauche à droite: le peu qui porte la parole quotidienne, puis la longue queue quasi invisible.abayatombe dans cette queue de rareté:

#1#100#1K#10K#100K
← used constantlyrarely used →

L'échelle est logarithmique (chaque tic ≈ 10× plus rare). Voisins rares de la même bande: « 7th » (#89,345), « abbadie » (#89,347), « abreuvés » (#89,348). Parmi 6,727 lemmes en « A », « abaya » est au #89,346. Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list.

Rare enough to double-check

abaya is uncommon French at frequency #89,346 among 6,727 “A” headwords, classed as anoun, transcribed \a.ba.ja\. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. 2 senses are on record.

No generated misspelling entries exist for abaya in our index, since its letter pattern doesn't lend itself to common typo substitutions. This entry stands alone in our confusable dataset, since no other headword is close enough in sound or shape to pair with it.

No borrowing history is documented for this entry, so its spelling is easiest explained by how it's pronounced rather than where it came from. The correct French form is abaya, spelled A-B-A-Y-A.

Definition

  1. 1
    Longue robe couvrante portée par certaines femmes du Moyen-Orient et des pays du Maghreb.
  2. 2
    Long vêtement porté par certains hommes, notamment au Liban.

Recorded use

Wiktionary examples

These source excerpts show how abaya appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.

  1. Ils nous font quoi avec l’abaya ?
  2. Les femmes non qataries ne sont pas tenues de porter l’abaya, une longue robe noire qui couvre la silhouette presque de la tête aux pieds, mais les touristes doivent s’assurer que les hauts couvrent leur ventre et leurs épaules, tandis que les jupes, les robes et les pantalons doivent cacher les genoux.

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 French corpus, MIT). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.

Frequently Asked Questions

How do you spell "abaya"?
"abaya" is spelled A-B-A-Y-A. The IPA pronunciation is \a.ba.ja\.
What does "abaya" mean?
As a noun, "abaya" means: Longue robe couvrante portée par certaines femmes du Moyen-Orient et des pays du Maghreb.
How do you pronounce "abaya"?
The IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) transcription for "abaya" is \a.ba.ja\. Click the speaker icon on the pronunciation badge above to hear it spoken aloud where audio is available.
What language does "abaya" come from?
"abaya" is a French word. You can look up definitions, pronunciations, and spelling data for this and other words across English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and German on PlainSpell.
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.

Similar French words by spelling shape

Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "abaya", not the corpus desk frequency band.

Same letter count

Frequency-ranked French headwords with 5 letters (nearest by frequency rank).

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list