# bow vs but

> English confusable word pair

## The two words

### bow
*noun · IPA /bəʊ/ · frequency rank #4,287*
A weapon made of a curved piece of wood or other flexible material whose ends are connected by a string, used for shooting arrows.

### but
*preposition · IPA /ˈbʌt/ · frequency rank #25*
Apart from, except (for), excluding.

## Source
Compiled from Wiktionary via kaikki.org (CC BY-SA). Data vintage: 2026-09-03.
Canonical page: https://plainspell.com/en/vs/bow-vs-but