beamedvsbehavedTell them apart

Quick tell: beamed is a adjective, behaved is a verb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“beamed” is an adjective and “behaved” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#28,834
“beamed” frequency rank
#13,100
“behaved” frequency rank
41934
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature beamed behaved
Definition Furnished with beams or timbers. simple past and past participle of behave

Letter map: beamed vs behaved

Shared letters muted; letters that set beamed and behaved apart highlighted. Shared run: 5.

6 ch
beamed
7 ch
behaved

Grammar separator: beamed vs behaved

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: beamed is anadjective and behavedaverb. On the page they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 41934, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

beamed is recorded at frequency rank #28,834, classified as anadj. behaved is at rank #13,100, tagged as averb, pronounced /bɪˈheɪvd/.

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 41934, this pair ranks #253,821 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of beamed vs behaved

Shared letters: abde. Private to "beamed": m. Private to "behaved": hv.

"beamed" · 6 letters · shape CVVCVC  ·  "behaved" · 7 letters · shape CVCVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • beamedbaemed · bbeamed · beaemd · beamde · beamedd · beammed · bemaed · ebamed
  • behavedbbehaved · beahved · behaevd · behavde · behavedd · behavved · behhaved · behvaed

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "beamed" and "behaved" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "beamed" is an adjective and "behaved" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary English text, does "beamed" or "behaved" show up more?
"behaved" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #13,100 in our English list, against #28,834 for "beamed". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Pair "beamed" vs "behaved" is on the table, pick a follow-up below.

  • Full dictionary entry for "beamed" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "behaved" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #253,821 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "beamed" and "behaved" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "beamed vs beamer". 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 #253,821 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