Which is the correct usage: "rack my brain" or "wrack my brain"? Google turned up pages with conflicting recommendations.
One argument is that to "rack a brain" comes from the torture device known as a rack.
Another from the now obsolete Yahoo Answers website was that wrack means damage or destruction or punishment and thus is correct.
Since I'm a SE user I'm inclined to immediately discount the second opinion from Yahoo Answers, but the logic seems plausible enough that I wanted to be sure.
On a related note, if rack is indeed correct, does the song Wrack My Brain by Ringo Starr simply have an ungrammatical title or is the error intentional?
Best Answer
The Oxford Dictionary Online (now Oxford Languages) says that the phrase could use either wrack or rack. They note that
However, according to this entry for wrack in EtymOnline, the term should be rack:
The PhraseFinder agrees that the phrase is rack your brains, adding:
Further, this book on common English errors says it should be rack:
The Grammarist agrees it should be rack as well.
That being said, there is some use of wrack your brains (blue line) as shown by this Google NGram. However, rack your brains is correct and more common:
There is some disagreement, but more sources say it should be rack. Thus it seems more likely that the phrase is rack your brains instead of wrack.