english-words (dwyl/english-words)
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What is this?
A text file of English words — over 466k per the README, 479k in the repo description — published for dictionary and word-based projects such as auto-complete and autosuggestion.
Is it a library I install, or just data files?
Just data files you download: words.txt with all words, wordsalpha.txt with letters-only words, and wordsdictionary.json with the same list as JSON.
How do I use it in a project?
Download the file you need and read it one word per line. In Python you can load wordsdictionary.json as a dictionary, where every word is mapped to 1 for faster lookups, with readenglishdictionary.py as the example.
Do I need Python or anything else installed to use it?
No — plain text and JSON can be read from any language. Python is optional: the README points out you can load the JSON dictionary in Python for faster performance.
Any catch with the word list itself?
words.txt is not purely alphabetic — it can contain entries with numbers or symbols — so reach for wordsalpha.txt when you need letters-only words. It is a static list with no API.
Can I use the word list freely in my own project?
Yes — the repo is under the Unlicense, a public domain dedication, though the words were extracted from an infochimps list whose copyright still belongs to them.
Where did the word list come from?
The author needed words for an auto-complete tutorial, found the infochimps list locked inside an Excel (.xls) file, and pulled the words out into a simple new-line-delimited text file that is easier to load into apps and databases.
What can I build with it?
Anything that needs an English vocabulary: auto-complete or autosuggestion features, a lookup dictionary, or seeding a database. The plain-text format was chosen precisely because it is more useful when building apps or importing into databases.
How current is the list?
It has grown over time: the README still says over 466k words while the repo description now advertises 479k. The project dates back to 2014, and no update schedule is documented.
What are similar projects?
chinese-xinhua, chinese-poetry, big-list-of-naughty-strings, awesome-nlp, lieflat-less-ai-tone, A-Programmers-Guide-to-English, prediction-market-analysis, pkl