alimonyvsalmondWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

“alimony” and “almond” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#25,653
“alimony” frequency rank
#14,264
“almond” frequency rank
39917
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature alimony almond
Definition A court-mandated allowance made to a former spouse by a divorced or legally separated person. The seed within the drupe of a small deciduous tree in family Rosaceae, Prunus amygdalus, considered a culinary nut.

Where the eye mixes alimony and almond

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence.

7 ch
alimony
6 ch
almond

Look-alike desk: alimony vs almond

A purely visual mix-up. alimony (/ˈæl.ɪ.mə.ni/) and almond (/ˈɑː.mənd/) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 39917, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

alimony is recorded at frequency rank #25,653, classified as anoun, pronounced /ˈæl.ɪ.mə.ni/. almond is at rank #14,264, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ˈɑː.mənd/.

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 39917, this pair ranks #272,316 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of alimony vs almond

Shared letters: almno. Private to "alimony": iy. Private to "almond": d.

"alimony" · 7 letters · shape VCVCVCV  ·  "almond" · 6 letters · shape VCCVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • alimonyailmony · alimmony · alimnoy · alimonny · alimonyy · alimoyn · aliomny · allimony
  • almondallmond · almmond · almnod · almodn · almondd · almonnd · alomnd · amlond

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "alimony" for "almond" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (/ˈæl.ɪ.mə.ni/ versus /ˈɑː.mənd/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "alimony" vs "almond" - which ranks higher?
"almond" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #14,264 in our English list, against #25,653 for "alimony". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "alimony" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "almond" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #272,316 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "alimony" and "almond" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "almond vs Alon". 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 #272,316 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list