Vowel team family · 10 words

Words that rhyme with "dying"

The -ying family is a vowel team — two or more letters working together to spell a single long-i (/aɪ/, as in "light") sound. Every word below ends in -ying and shares the same ending sound as "dying".

Why two letters make one sound

In a vowel team like -ying, the letters don't get sounded out one by one. They function as a single unit that maps to one vowel sound — long-i (/aɪ/, as in "light") in this case. Underlining the team as a chunk helps young readers stop trying to blend each letter separately. The old rule "when two vowels go walking, the first does the talking" works for some teams (ai, ee, oa) but not all (ie, ow, oo, au) — it's safer to teach each team as its own pattern. All 10 words in this hub share the same -ying chunk and rhyme cleanly.

Try the rhyme aloud

  1. Match it: "dying" rhymes with "buying" and "denying" — same ending, same sound.
  2. Echo it: Say "crying, buying, denying" aloud and feel how each ends the same way.
  3. Stretch it: Now add "applying" — four words, one ending, all in the -ying family.

All 10 words ending in -ying

A (1)

applying 8 letters

B (1)

buying 6 letters

C (2)

crying 6 letters complying 9 letters

D (6)

denying 7 letters dying 5 letters defying 7 letters drying 6 letters dyeing 6 letters decrying 8 letters

Related rhyme families

Other rhyme families that share sounds or spellings with -ying.

Teaching this rhyme family

  • Underline or highlight the vowel team as one unit so it isn't read letter-by-letter.
  • Practise reading the team in isolation ("-ying, -ying, -ying") before reading it inside a word.
  • Build word ladders: change just the starting consonant and let the team stay constant (e.g. crying, buying, denying).