Most Common English Words

What are the most common English words? is a question often asked, for example:-

  • What are the most common English words? or
  • What are the 100 most common English words? or
  • What are the 200 most common English words? or
  • What are the 1,000 most common English words? etc. etc.

Of course, these are not unreasonable questions as learning the most commonly used English words in stages is a way to start building up your vocabulary.

What I mean by stages is to set yourself a target of learning say the first 100  most common English words in a certain period of time which you set yourself, say in one month, and then the next 100 in another month and so on.

However the problem with this approach is that you do not know how to put the words together and use them correctly.

For example a word that is certainly in the top 100 and is probably the number one most used English word is the word THE. On its own it has no meaning whatsoever but put together with a noun (a noun being a word for a person, place or thing) the house or the car or the lady it has a meaning.

If the list of the most commonly used English words is expanded to say the top 500 most commonly used  English words you will find that there are various types of words for example nouns, definite and indefinite articles, verbs etc. etc.

Now I hear you say what is a noun, what is an indefinite article, what is a verb? If you want to find out what each of these are then of course you can just search on the internet using say Google and type in, for example, ‘what is a noun’. Alternatively using the link on this page on the right at the bottom where you will find a link to the Oxford English Dictionary.

However the same problem remains, as mentioned above, if you learn all 500 words, how do I use these words correctly in a sentence or when speaking?

By all means go ahead and learn say the top 100 most used English words I suggest but do please learn these words in conjunction with being taught English properly and professionally by a native English speaker otherwise you will be so frustrated due to the fact that you will not know how to use the individual most used English words effectively and correctly.

Out of interest, of course, it is interesting to see what the most commonly used English words are but anything beyond this interest I would suggest is not very beneficial. It’s better to learn how the words are used at the appropriate time in a properly structured tuition program for learning English.

Finally having written a little here in my post today about the most common English words you will find a list here 

 

 

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