Which to use
“bothered” is an adjective and “buttered” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #7,531
- “bothered” frequency rank
- #34,812
- “buttered” frequency rank
- 42343
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | bothered | buttered |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Annoyed; irritated. | simple past and past participle of butter |
Letter map: bothered vs buttered
Shared letters muted; letters that set bothered and buttered apart highlighted. Shared run: 6.
Role in the sentence - bothered and buttered
Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: bothered is anadjective and butteredaverb. On the page they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 42343, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
bothered is recorded at frequency rank #7,531, classified as anadj. buttered is at rank #34,812, tagged as averb, pronounced /ˈbʌtəɹd/.
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 42343, this pair ranks #250,092 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of bothered vs buttered
Shared letters: bdert. Private to "bothered": ho. Private to "buttered": u.
"bothered" · 8 letters · shape CVCCVCVC · "buttered" · 8 letters · shape CVCCVCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Can "bothered" and "buttered" be used interchangeably?
In ordinary English text, does "bothered" or "buttered" show up more?
Useful next steps
Pair "bothered" vs "buttered" is on the table, pick a follow-up below.
- Full dictionary entry for "bothered" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "buttered" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #250,092 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "bothered" and "buttered" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "butted vs buttered". 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 #250,092 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.