Palindrome — Checker, Examples & Meaning
A palindrome reads the same forwards and backwards. Type or paste anything below to check it instantly. A palindrome is a word, phrase, or number that reads the same forwards and backwards. Type or paste anything into the checker below — it ignores spaces, punctuation, and capitalisation and shows the result live as you type. Switch on multi-line mode to check a whole list at once, or click any example below to load it in.
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Palindrome examples
One-word palindromes
The classic palindromes: words that read the same letter-for-letter forwards and backwards. Short, common, and useful for trivia, Scrabble openers, and primary-school spelling games. Here are some of the most popular by length — use the links below the table for the full lists.
More one-word palindromes by length: 3-letter · 4-letter · 5-letter · 6-letter · 7-letter
| Word / Phrase | Cleaned | Length |
|---|---|---|
| aa | aa | 2 |
| oo | oo | 2 |
| dad | dad | 3 |
| eye | eye | 3 |
| mom | mom | 3 |
| pop | pop | 3 |
| sis | sis | 3 |
| wow | wow | 3 |
| deed | deed | 4 |
| kook | kook | 4 |
| noon | noon | 4 |
| peep | peep | 4 |
| sees | sees | 4 |
| toot | toot | 4 |
| civic | civic | 5 |
| kayak | kayak | 5 |
| level | level | 5 |
| madam | madam | 5 |
| radar | radar | 5 |
| rotor | rotor | 5 |
| denned | denned | 6 |
| hallah | hallah | 6 |
| marram | marram | 6 |
| redder | redder | 6 |
| terret | terret | 6 |
| deified | deified | 7 |
| racecar | racecar | 7 |
| repaper | repaper | 7 |
| reviver | reviver | 7 |
| rotator | rotator | 7 |
Palindrome names
Names that are themselves palindromes. These are useful for trivia, baby-name shortlists, and any time you need a Scrabble-legal proper noun. Anna, Eve, Otto, and Hannah are the most recognisable in English; international names like Aviva extend the set.
| Word / Phrase | Cleaned | Length |
|---|---|---|
| Ada | ada | 3 |
| Asa | asa | 3 |
| Ava | ava | 3 |
| Bob | bob | 3 |
| Eve | eve | 3 |
| Lil | lil | 3 |
| Nan | nan | 3 |
| Viv | viv | 3 |
| Abba | abba | 4 |
| Anna | anna | 4 |
| Elle | elle | 4 |
| Otto | otto | 4 |
| Aviva | aviva | 5 |
| Natan | natan | 5 |
| Hannah | hannah | 6 |
Palindrome sentences and phrases
The structural acrobatics that have entertained writers and word puzzlers for centuries. Each phrase below reads the same forwards and backwards once you strip spaces and punctuation. Click any entry to load it into the checker and verify for yourself.
| Word / Phrase | Cleaned | Length |
|---|---|---|
| Don't nod | dontnod | 7 |
| Taco cat | tacocat | 7 |
| Madam, I'm Adam | madamimadam | 11 |
| Yo, banana boy! | yobananaboy | 11 |
| Step on no pets | steponnopets | 12 |
| Never odd or even | neveroddoreven | 14 |
| No lemon, no melon | nolemonnomelon | 14 |
| A Toyota's a Toyota | atoyotasatoyota | 15 |
| A nut for a jar of tuna | anutforajaroftuna | 17 |
| Mr. Owl ate my metal worm | mrowlatemymetalworm | 19 |
| Sit on a potato pan, Otis | sitonapotatopanotis | 19 |
| Was it a car or a cat I saw? | wasitacaroracatisaw | 19 |
| Rats live on no evil star | ratsliveonnoevilstar | 20 |
| A man, a plan, a canal: Panama | amanaplanacanalpanama | 21 |
| SATOR AREPO TENET OPERA ROTAS | satorarepotenetoperarotas | 25 |
| Go hang a salami, I'm a lasagna hog | gohangasalamiimalasagnahog | 26 |
Palindrome numbers and dates
Numeric palindromes read the same in both directions just like word palindromes do. Useful for recreational mathematics, magic squares, and palindromic date trivia. Palindromic dates like 02/02/2020 and 22/02/2022 routinely make headlines as social-media curiosities, and the next big calendar palindrome is 21/12/2112.
| Word / Phrase | Cleaned | Length |
|---|---|---|
| 11 | 11 | 2 |
| 121 | 121 | 3 |
| 1001 | 1001 | 4 |
| 1991 | 1991 | 4 |
| 12321 | 12321 | 5 |
| 14641 | 14641 | 5 |
| 1234321 | 1234321 | 7 |
| 02/02/2020 | 02022020 | 8 |
| 11/02/2011 | 11022011 | 8 |
| 12/02/2021 | 12022021 | 8 |
| 21/12/2112 | 21122112 | 8 |
| 22/02/2022 | 22022022 | 8 |
| 123454321 | 123454321 | 9 |
Longest palindromes
The upper bound of palindrome length, in English and a few other languages. James Joyce's tattarrattat (12 letters, from Ulysses, 1922) holds the Oxford English Dictionary's longest-entry title. Guinness World Records gives the title for "everyday use" to detartrated at 11 letters. The longest known palindromic word in any major language is the Finnish saippuakivikauppias (a soapstone vendor) at 19 letters.
| Word / Phrase | Cleaned | Length |
|---|---|---|
| malayalam | malayalam | 9 |
| redivider | redivider | 9 |
| rotavator | rotavator | 9 |
| aibohphobia | aibohphobia | 11 |
| detartrated | detartrated | 11 |
| kinnikinnik | kinnikinnik | 11 |
| tattarrattat | tattarrattat | 12 |
| saippuakivikauppias | saippuakivikauppias | 19 |
What is a palindrome?
A palindrome is a sequence of characters — letters, words, or numbers — that reads the same in both directions. RACECAR is a palindrome. So is 12321. So is “A man, a plan, a canal: Panama,” once you ignore the spaces, commas, and capitalisation. Palindromes traditionally do — the convention is to compare the letters or digits themselves, not the formatting around them.
The word palindrome comes from the Greek palíndromos, meaning “running back again”: palin (“again”) + dromos (“running”). The English playwright Ben Jonson is generally credited with coining the term in the 17th century.
Palindromic structure shows up far beyond word puzzles. The Sator Square, a five-line Latin grid containing sator, arepo, tenet, opera, and rotas, is a palindromic word square found inscribed at Pompeii, Herculaneum, and several medieval European churches. Palindromic numbers are studied in recreational mathematics, and palindromic dates routinely make news as social-media curiosities. The structure has fascinated writers from Roman poets to James Joyce, who introduced English's longest dictionary palindrome (tattarrattat) in Ulysses.
For more wordplay tools, try the Anagram Solver to find every word that can be made from a set of letters, the Wordle Solver for help with daily Wordle, the Scrabble Word Finder for tournament-legal plays from your rack, or Lingle — The Word Finder's daily word game. The full library of TWF tools is on the Word Finder homepage.
Frequently asked questions
A palindrome is a word, phrase, or number that reads the same forwards and backwards. "Racecar" is one. So is 12321. So is the sentence "A man, a plan, a canal, Panama," if you ignore the spaces and punctuation. Palindromes traditionally do.
Type or paste anything into the box. The checker strips out spaces, punctuation, and capital letters, then compares what's left against its own reverse. If the two match, you have a palindrome. The reversed text is shown below the result so you can see exactly what was compared.
No. It ignores spaces, punctuation, and capitalisation. That's why "Madam, I'm Adam" counts as a palindrome. The comma and apostrophe drop out, the capital M becomes lowercase, and what's left ("madamimadam") reads the same forwards and backwards.
Yes. 11, 121, 12321, and 1234321 are all palindromes. So are palindromic dates like 02/02/2020, once you ignore the slashes. Mathematicians have studied numeric palindromes as a curiosity in number theory.
The Oxford English Dictionary's longest entry is "tattarrattat," a 12-letter word for a knock on the door, coined by James Joyce in Ulysses (1922). Guinness World Records gives the title to "detartrated" at 11 letters. The longest palindromic word in everyday use in any language is the Finnish "saippuakivikauppias" (a soapstone vendor), at 19 letters.
Yes. Paste any sentence into the box and the checker handles it the same way it handles a single word. The longer the sentence, the more impressive the palindrome. Try "Was it a car or a cat I saw?" to see a classic one in action.
They're a small puzzle hidden inside ordinary language. Once you spot a palindrome, you can't unsee it. That's why they show up in poetry, math, music, programming interviews, and the kind of family arguments that end with "Wait, is 'no lemon, no melon' really a palindrome?"