Which to use
“alley” is a noun and “alls” is a determiner - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #8,634
- “alley” frequency rank
- #44,608
- “alls” frequency rank
- 53242
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | alley | alls |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | A narrow street or passageway, especially one through the middle of a block giving access to the rear of lots of buildings. | All. |
Where the eye mixes alley and alls
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. alley runs 5 letters (VCCVV) against alls's 4 (VCCC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Visual trap between alley and alls
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: alley is /ˈæl.i/ while alls is /ɔːlz/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs determiner), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 53242, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
alley is recorded at frequency rank #8,634, classified as anoun, pronounced /ˈæl.i/. alls is at rank #44,608, tagged as adet, pronounced /ɔːlz/.
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 53242, this pair ranks #150,608 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of alley vs alls
Shared letters: al. Private to "alley": ey. Private to "alls": s.
"alley" · 5 letters · shape VCCVV · "alls" · 4 letters · shape VCCC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "alley" and "alls" mean the same thing in a sentence?
Frequency check: "alley" vs "alls" - which ranks higher?
Useful next steps
Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.
- Full dictionary entry for "alley" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "alls" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #150,608 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "alley" and "alls" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "algo vs alls". 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 #150,608 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.