Word Pronunciation & Dictionary

tess

/tɛs/

Word Rarity Rare

Frequency: Zipf frequency 3.23 in modern English

Syllables: tess
IPA: /tɛs/

4

Scrabble Score

4

Letters

1

Syllables

3

Unique Chars

Meaning

name

A diminutive of the female given name Teresa.

name

A surname from German.

name

Initialism of Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite, a planned space telescope for NASA's Explorers program.

Example Sentences

"Cynthia and Melinda, reduced to Cindy and Mindy, as Carella had dreaded would happen from the moment she named them. Her older daughter had fared better. Tess, modern and sleek for Teresa, which conjured up cobblestoned streets in a mountain village in Potenza."
"The dedicated time Cheops spent observing the star helped astronomers iron out the mixed signals from the TESS data to determine how many planets were crossing in front of the star and the resonance of their orbits."

Etymology

Borrowed from German Tess, a variant of Tesch.

Origin

Source language: German

Word Breakdown

Root: Tess

Inflected Forms

Tesses (plural)

Derived Forms

Tessica Tessie Tessy TOI

Rhymes With

yes less guess press success unless vs dress stress express mess des

Questions

How do you pronounce tess?: The recorded pronunciation is /tɛs/.
What does tess mean?: A diminutive of the female given name Teresa.
Where does tess come from?: It is traced to German.

How to pronounce tess

Open the pronunciation page — Open the Speakur entry for “tess”.
Read the phonetic spelling — Read the IPA spelling (/tɛs/) so you know which sounds to aim for.
Play the audio — Click Play to hear reference audio for “tess”.
Repeat and practice — Say “tess” aloud, matching stress and vowels until it feels natural.