August 31, 2022 at 12:12 am

Figuring Out the Longest Words in the English Language

by Matthew Gilligan

Have you ever thought about this question…what are the longest words in the English language?

Sure, a lot of people have!

And Dr. Erica Brozovsky of PBS’ Otherwords tried to get to the bottom of it.

Confused

Brozovsky determined that instead of looking for the word that has the most letters, she’d try to determine what are the longest words that are commonly used in modern times.

After she came to her conclusion, Brozovsky said,

“These are three of the longest, non-spaced, non-hyphenated English words that are considered “in common usage”.

If these slip past your ear without slowing down your comprehension, then we could safely call these part of your shared vocabulary and strong contenders for the longest, commonly used word in English, to you.”

One of the words is “incomprehensibilities.”

Not too long, right?

Watch the video below to see what the other two words are!

twistedsifter on facebook Figuring Out the Longest Words in the English Language