allegevsArleneWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: allege is a verb, Arlene is a name, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“allege” is a verb and “Arlene” is a name - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#22,884
“allege” frequency rank
#30,317
“Arlene” frequency rank
53201
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature allege Arlene
Definition To state under oath, to plead. A female given name originating as a coinage.

Letter map: allege vs Arlene

Shared letters muted; letters that set allege and Arlene apart highlighted. Shared run: 4. allege and Arlene follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (VCCVCV). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

6 ch
allege
6 ch
Arlene

Part-of-speech tell for allege / Arlene

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: allege is averb and Arleneaname. On the page they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 53201, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

allege is recorded at frequency rank #22,884, classified as averb, pronounced /əˈlɛd͡ʒ/. Arlene is at rank #30,317, tagged as aname.

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 53201, this pair ranks #150,945 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of allege vs Arlene

Shared letters: ael. Private to "allege": g. Private to "Arlene": nr.

"allege" · 6 letters · shape VCCVCV  ·  "Arlene" · 6 letters · shape VCCVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • allege ← alege · alelge · alleeg · allegge · allgee · lalege
  • Arlene ← alrene · arelne · arleen · arlenne · arllene · arlnee · arrlene · ralene

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "allege" for "Arlene" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "allege" is a verb and "Arlene" a name, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "allege" vs "Arlene" - which ranks higher?
"allege" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #22,884 in our English list, against #30,317 for "Arlene". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

You've compared "allege" and "Arlene". Here's where to go from here.

  • Full dictionary entry for "allege" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "Arlene" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #150,945 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "allege" and "Arlene" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "aline vs Arlene". 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 #150,945 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