Which to use
“clear” is an adjective and “cleary” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #558
- “clear” frequency rank
- #30,734
- “cleary” frequency rank
- 31292
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | clear | cleary |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Transparent in colour. | A clear marble (sphere used in games), usually colored, but without decoration or design. |
Letter map: clear vs cleary
Shared letters muted; letters that set clear and cleary apart highlighted. Shared run: 5.
Part-of-speech tell for clear / cleary
Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: clear is anadjective and clearyanoun. On the page they differ by 1 extra letter(s) - “clear” sits inside “cleary”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 31292, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
clear is recorded at frequency rank #558, classified as anadj, pronounced /klɪə/. cleary is at rank #30,734, tagged as anoun.
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 31292, this pair ranks #347,335 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of clear vs cleary
Shared letters: acelr. Private to "clear": -. Private to "cleary": y.
"clear" · 5 letters · shape CCVVC · "cleary" · 6 letters · shape CCVVCV
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "clear" for "cleary" ever safe?
Which is more common, "clear" or "cleary"?
What to do next
Pair "clear" vs "cleary" is on the table, pick a follow-up below.
- Full dictionary entry for "clear" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "cleary" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #347,335 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "clear" and "cleary" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "clary vs cleary". 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 #347,335 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.