monosyllable

/ˌˈmɑnəˌsɪləbəl/

Other forms: monosyllables

A monosyllable is a word that has only one syllable, or beat of sound. The sentence, "A good friend is hard to find, but a good dog is not," contains only monosyllables.

A single syllable of speech has one vowel sound, which could be written with two letters — like ea sometimes makes the long e sound — and may have consonants around it. More than half of English words are monosyllables, meaning they have just one vowel sound. Most basic words are monosyllables, like a, the, he, and she. But longer words can be monosyllables, too: The nine-letter word stretched is a monosyllable (it's pronounced /strecht/).

Definitions of monosyllable

1. noun

   a word or utterance that has only one vowel or vowel-like sound, with or without consonants surrounding it
   synonyms: monosyllabic word

   type of:

   word

   a unit of language that native speakers can identify