List of English words without rhymes

The following is a list of English words without rhymes, called refractory rhymes—that is, a list of words in the English language that rhyme with no other English word. The word "rhyme" here is used in the strict sense, called a perfect rhyme, that the words are pronounced the same from the vowel of the main stressed syllable onwards. The list was compiled from the point of view of Received Pronunciation (with a few exceptions for General American), and may not work for other accents or dialects. Multiple-word rhymes (a phrase that rhymes with a word, known as a phrasal or mosaic rhyme), self-rhymes (adding a prefix to a word and counting it as a rhyme of itself), imperfect rhymes (such as purple with circle), and identical rhymes (words that are identical in their stressed syllables, such as bay and obey) are often not counted as true rhymes and have not been considered. Only the list of one-syllable words can hope to be anything near complete; there are many disyllabic or polysyllabic words without rhymes.

Definition of perfect rhyme

Following the strict definition of rhyme, a perfect rhyme demands the exact match of all sounds from the last stressed vowel to the end of the word. Therefore, words with the stress far from the end are more likely to have no perfect rhymes. For instance, a perfect rhyme for discom<small>BOB</small>ulate would have to rhyme three syllables, -<small>OB</small>ulate. There are many words that match most of the sounds from the stressed vowel onwards and so are near rhymes, called slant rhymes. Ovulate, copulate, and populate, for example, vary only slightly in one consonant from discombobulate, and thus provide very usable rhymes for most situations in which a rhyme for discombobulate is desired. However, no other English word has exactly these three final syllables with this stress pattern. And since in most traditions the stressed syllable should not be identical—the consonant before the stressed vowel should be different—adding a prefix to a word, as be-elbow for elbow, does not create a perfect rhyme for it.

Words that rhyme in one accent or dialect may not rhyme in another. A commonplace example of this is the word of , which when stressed had no rhymes in British Received Pronunciation prior to the 19th century, but which rhymed with grave and mauve in some varieties of General American. In the other direction, iron has no rhyme in General American, but many in RP. Words may also have more than one pronunciation, one with a rhyme, and one without.

Non-rhyming English words

The majority of words with antepenultimate stress, such as ambulance, citizen, dangerous and obvious, are non-rhyming. Also, most words with stress, such as (un)necessary, logarithm, algorithm and sacrificing, have no rhyme.

Masculine rhymes

Refractory one-syllable rhymes are uncommon; there may be fewer than a hundred in English. A great many end in a present or historical suffix -th, or are plural or participle forms. This list includes a few polysyllabic masculine rhymes such as obliged, which have one syllable in their rhyming part.

1. '
2. ' /-ælb/ (rhymes with some pronunciations of the proper noun "Kalb" in the name of Johann de Kalb)
3. ' /-ʌŋst/ ("quincunxed" qualifies apart from the final syllable being unstressed)
4. '
5. '
6. '
7. , -s
8. '
9. , -s, -ed
10. ' (may rhyme with "valsed" in British English, according to the Oxford English Dictionary)
11. ' (combinations)
12. '
13. '
14. '
15. , -s
16. '
17. , -s
18. ' (verb)
19. '
20. , -ed, -s (has rhymes for those who drop the f or th)
21. '
22. '
23. '
24. '
25. '
26. ' (but not when pronounced as )
27. '
28. '
29. '
30. , -s
31. '
32. '
33. '
34. '
35. ' or
36. '
37. '
38. , -s
39. ,
40. '
41. '
42. '
43. '
44. '
45. '
46. , -s The "f" in "twelfth" is commonly elided in casual speech, causing "twelfth" to rhyme with "health" and "wealth".
47. '
48. , -ed, -s
49. '
50. '
51. ' (the word is also pronounced with , in which case it has rhymes like "pith")
52. , -ed, -s
53. , -d, -s
54. '
55. '

' and ' have no rhymes in conservative RP. However, the distinction between horse and hoarse has been mostly lost in younger generations, and for them and many others pork which was an exception to the normal rule, now rhymes with fork and cork (), while forge now rhymes with gorge. The OED no longer lists as an alternative pronunciation in its third edition.

Nonce words ending in -ed ('provided with') may produce other potentially refractory masculine rhymes. There are additional words which are only partially assimilated into English, such as Russian ' , which are refractory rhymes.

The contraction ' has no known rhymes in any English dialect, however the legitimacy of contractions as a single word is disputed. Regardless of this, daren't lacks both perfect rhymes and phrasal rhymes.

Although not meant as a complete list, there are some additional refractory rhymes in GA. Some of these are due to RP being a non-rhotic accent, and having merged rhymes formerly distinguished by .

1. , -s
2. '
3. '

Feminine rhymes

For feminine rhymes, the final two syllables must match to count as a rhyme. Once the stress shifts to the penultimate syllable, rhymeless words are quite common. The following words are representative, but there are thousands of others.

1. '
2. '
3. '
4. '
5. '
6. '
7. '
8. '
9. '
10. '
11. '
12. '
13. '
14. '
15. '
16. '
17. '
18. '
19. '
20. '
21. '
22. '
23. '

Words with obscure perfect rhymes

This list includes rhymes of words that have been listed as rhymeless.

Masculine rhymes

• ' (rhymes with the Scots pronunciations of various other words, e.g. "pairt", a Scots variant of "part", and "smairt", a Scots variant of "smart")
• ' rhymes with dialectal ' (the bony point on the rump of an ox or cow), ', a hypocoristic for the name Rachel, one pronunciation of obsolete ' (a streak down a horse's face), and the surname of Anne Heche.
• ' rhymes with manxed and ', self-indulgent self-pity (a portmanteau of wank and angst); phalanxed is not a perfect rhyme because the stress is on the wrong syllable. The alternative American pronunciation has no rhymes.
• ' rhymes with ', a colour between grey and beige (though etymologically unrelated to them).
• ' rhymes with ', from ', to squirt with water or mist, schizzed as in ', and one pronunciation of "midst".
• , -s rhymes with ' (etymology 2), the sound made by an elastic object when struck by or striking a hard object, and '/', the sound of a metallic vibration.
• ' rhymes with ', American slang for 'attached'.
• , borshcht rhymes with dialectical ' (washed))
• ' rhymes with bairn, a Northern English and Scottish word meaning child; and Nairn, a town and formal royal burgh in Scotland.
• ' rhymes with lensed, "provided with a lens or lenses".
• ' rhymes with ', slang for "boyfriend".
• ' rhymes with ', another word for an adit.
• ' rhymes with , an acronym for "dual-specificity phosphatase enzyme".
• ' rhymes with Cuth, a hypocoristic for the name Cuthbert, as in "Cuth's Day" at St. Cuthbert's Society.
• ' rhymes with ', too overcome with emotion to speak. (Furthermore, if the rime is pronounced as , it rhymes with exempt, tempt, etc.)
• ' rhymes with ', the fish Silurus glanis; and ', a hypocoristic for the name Chelsea.
• ' rhymes with Castilian Spanish merced, 'gift', which is occasionally used in English.
• ' rhymes with ', Scottish word for the portion of an estate assessed for the stipend of the clergy, and archaic Scottish '.
• , -s rhymes with ', Scottish word for dust. The plural films rhymes with Wilms, a German surname and a kidney tumor
• ' rhymes with ', a hypocoristic for the name Angela; and one pronunciation of ', short for ganja.
• ' rhymes with North's, belonging to someone named North (such as Oliver North or Kanye West and Kim Kardashian's daughter North West).
• , -s rhymes with , which is rarely found in the singular; one pronunciation of , the synthesizer brand name; Droog, the sister catalogue to Delia*s for boys; , a green Yemeni sauce; , a savory Persian yogurt drink; , a slang term for a person who has an outdated idea of what is trendy; the , short for the boogaloo movement; and Zoog Disney. The plural rhymes with the name of Zoogz Rift.
• ' rhymes with ' (etymology 2), a hundredth or thousandth of the monetary units of many Arab countries.
• , -s rhymes with (pl. Sulfs), any of a number of sulfate-regulating enzymes.
• , -s, if pronounced , rhymes with the surname Milne. The plural rhymes with Milne's, belonging to someone with the surname Milne.
• ' rhymes with the English pronunciation of ', a city in France, and a kind of porcelain. It also rhymes with a common pronunciation of ', especially when referring to the Internet meme.
• ' rhymes with ', the archaic second-person singular for did (used with '). The alternate pronunciation rhymes with ' and '.
• ' rhymes with ', a mathematical term; also ' (n + 1)th and compounds like ' (= ninety-first). This also appears in fractions and so takes the plural, as in twenty thirty-.
• ' rhymes with ', a hypocoristic for the name Nigel.
• , -s rhymes with '/', a colloquial interjection expressing the stealing or sudden acquisition of something; '/', a slang word meaning "to have sex with"; and Spoink, a Pokémon species introduced in Generation III.
• ' rhymes with ', a word milkmaids use to get a cow to move.
• ' rhymes with ', meaning "wandered/roamed" or "became vague/acted vaguely".
• ' rhymes with ', colloquial for synthesizer.
• ' rhymes with /, Scots for "to screech", and one pronunciation of ', a rare Scottish word meaning "cautiously aloof".
• ' rhymes with ', having ridden on a luge.
• ' rhymes with ', vulgar slang; and ', a hypocorism for the name Wilfred.
• ' rhymes with ', a measure of two hanks of linen thread in Scotland; and Cresp, a French surname.
• ' rhymes with Norsk, a rural locality in Russia
• ' rhymes with ', the third-person singular form of the dialectal verb scuft.
• ' rhymes with schmaltzed, as in "schmaltzed up" (see ').
• ' rhymes with knosp, "an ornament in the form of a bud or knob".
• ' rhymes with ', the variant of usually used in fantasy of the Tolkienian model. It also rhymes with ', the plural of corf, a type of basket.
• ' (when not pronounced to rhyme with curl or floral) rhymes with schorl, a variety of tourmaline.
• ' rhymes with obsolete ', meaning length.
• ' rhymes with ', the plural of oik, a slang term for a boorish member of the lower class in the U.K. and Ireland. It also forms an identity rhyme with '.

Feminine rhymes

• ' rhymes with ', an Irish or Welsh melody for the harp.
• ' rhymes with Bugula, a genus of bryozoan, in American English.
• ' rhymes with naos, the inner chamber of a temple.
• ' rhymes with Jimny, a model of car from Japanese automaker Suzuki.
• ' rhymes with ', any of the smaller species of auks, in General American, in which the vowel in the accented syllable is pronounced /ɑ/ in both words.
• ' rhymes with ', to pull in all one's limbs; ', like a stepmother; ', a geometric shape resembling a square with rounded edges (e.g., Lamé's special quartic); ', an opercular bone; and the surnames of Angela Merkel (as pronounced in English), Studs Terkel, and Steve Urkel.
• ' rhymes with murcous, having cut off one's thumb; and Quercus, a genus of oak.
• ' rhymes with ', having a hymen of a specified description, as in the word tough-hymened.
• ' rhymes with the surname of Vivian Selbo.
• ' rhymes with ', as in anchusic acid; ', having a disorder that causes alterations in one's sense of taste; ', lacking a sense of taste; and ', a lizard of Europe and Central Asia.
• ' , in American English, rhymes with Lutron, an electronics company based in Coopersburg, Pennsylvania.
• , -s rhymes with ', a minority group in Myanmar, and ', a Christian who practices martial arts (in rhotic accents such as General American; in non-rhotic accents such as RP, these words also rhyme with ginger, injure, etc.).
• ' (with a short 0), , rhymes with Hoppus, a method of measuring timber and surname of Mark Hoppus, lead singer of Blink-182; and, in American English, one pronunciation of ', Mexican finger food.
• ' , rhymes with "door hinge" in certain accents; Blorenge, a hill in Wales; and "blorange", slang for a hair color between blond and orange. Webster's Third gives two pronunciations for sporange, one of which rhymes. However, one is a spelling pronunciation based on orange, and the OED only has the non-rhyming pronunciation, with the stress on the ange : . The American pronunciation of orange with one syllable has no rhyme, even in non-rhotic accents.
• ' rhymes with Yankton, a member of a western branch of the Dakota people and several American place names named after the people.
• ' , in American English, rhymes with the Hebrew names ', ' and '; ', a dialectal contraction for "no, ma'am"; or with ' (/ˈfləʊ.əm/) (pronunciations vary).
• ' rhymes with ', to have sex.
• ' rhymes with ', the hindquarters of a horse or donkey, ', to walk with a limp, , the act of roughly twisting a nipple (slang).
• ' rhymes with Lytham, a seaside town in England; and smitham, fine malt or ore dust.
• ' rhymes with ', a female lamb.
• ' rhymes with ', a type of triangle in heraldry; ', meaning to encircle or surround; the given names ' and '; and ', meaning infinity.
• ' rhymes with the surnames ' and '
• ' rhymes with ', an eyelet.
• ' rhymes with (some pronunciations), a Persian coin and military division.
• ' rhymes with liberum arbitrium, a legal term.

See also

• List of closed pairs of English rhyming words

Notes

External links

• Slant rhymes for words without perfect rhymes