Which to use
“adhering” is a verb and “admiring” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #24,371
- “adhering” frequency rank
- #19,518
- “admiring” frequency rank
- 43889
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | adhering | admiring |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | present participle and gerund of adhere | Feeling or showing admiration. |
Letter map: adhering vs admiring
Shared letters muted; letters that set adhering and admiring apart highlighted. Shared run: 6. adhering and admiring follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (VCCVCVCC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.
Part-of-speech tell for adhering / admiring
Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: adhering is averb and admiringanadjective. On the page they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 43889, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
adhering is recorded at frequency rank #24,371, classified as averb. admiring is at rank #19,518, tagged as anadj, pronounced /ædˈmaɪ.ɚ.ɪŋ/.
Glosses for this pair are partially populated in our dataset, but the full side-by-side definitions above should still guide you to the right choice.
With a confusion score of 43889, this pair ranks #235,718 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of adhering vs admiring
Shared letters: adginr. Private to "adhering": eh. Private to "admiring": m.
"adhering" · 8 letters · shape VCCVCVCC · "admiring" · 8 letters · shape VCCVCVCC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "adhering" and "admiring" mean the same thing in a sentence?
Which is more common, "adhering" or "admiring"?
Useful next steps
Pair "adhering" vs "admiring" is on the table, pick a follow-up below.
- Full dictionary entry for "adhering" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "admiring" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #235,718 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "adhering" and "admiring" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "adherent vs adhering". Nearby pair
- Recorded mistypes exist for at least one side of this pair, useful when a spell-checker or OCR lands on the wrong form. See mistypes
Confusion rank #235,718 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.