arrogancevsarrogantWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: arrogance is a noun, arrogant is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“arrogance” is a noun and “arrogant” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#13,856
“arrogance” frequency rank
#10,491
“arrogant” frequency rank
24347
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature arrogance arrogant
Definition The state of being arrogant; a type of extreme or foolish pride in which someone feels much superior to another. Having excessive pride in oneself, often with contempt or disrespect for others.

Where the eye mixes arrogance and arrogant

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 7 letters in sequence.

9 ch
arrogance
8 ch
arrogant

Why the eye confuses arrogance with arrogant

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: arrogance is /ˈæɹ.ə.ɡəns/ while arrogant is /ˈæɹ.ə.ɡənt/. 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 adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 24347, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

arrogance is recorded at frequency rank #13,856, classified as anoun, pronounced /ˈæɹ.ə.ɡəns/. arrogant is at rank #10,491, tagged as anadj, pronounced /ˈæɹ.ə.ɡənt/.

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 24347, this pair ranks #402,632 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of arrogance vs arrogant

Shared letters: agnor. Private to "arrogance": ce. Private to "arrogant": t.

"arrogance" · 9 letters · shape VCCVCVCCV  ·  "arrogant" · 8 letters · shape VCCVCVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • arrogancearogance · arorgance · arrgoance · arroagnce · arrogacne · arrogancce · arroganec · arrogannce
  • arrogantarogant · arorgant · arrgoant · arroagnt · arrogannt · arrogantt · arrogatn · arroggant

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "arrogance" for "arrogant" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "arrogance" is a noun and "arrogant" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "arrogance" or "arrogant"?
"arrogant" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #10,491 in our English list, against #13,856 for "arrogance". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Eye-level mix-up between "arrogance" and "arrogant" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "arrogance" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "arrogant" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #402,632 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • 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 #402,632 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