cummingvscursingWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

“cumming” and “cursing” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#22,051
“cumming” frequency rank
#19,304
“cursing” frequency rank
41355
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature cumming cursing
Definition present participle and gerund of cum present participle and gerund of curse

Where the eye mixes cumming and cursing

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence. cumming and cursing follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCCVCC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

7 ch
cumming
7 ch
cursing

Look-alike desk: cumming vs cursing

A purely visual mix-up. cumming (/ˈkʌmɪŋ/) and cursing (/ˈkɝsɪŋ/) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 41355, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

cumming is recorded at frequency rank #22,051, classified as averb, pronounced /ˈkʌmɪŋ/. cursing is at rank #19,304, tagged as averb, pronounced /ˈkɝsɪŋ/.

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 41355, this pair ranks #259,226 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of cumming vs cursing

Shared letters: cginu. Private to "cumming": m. Private to "cursing": rs.

"cumming" · 7 letters · shape CVCCVCC  ·  "cursing" · 7 letters · shape CVCCVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • cumming ← ccumming · cmuming · cumimng · cuming · cummign · cummingg · cumminng · cummnig
  • cursing ← ccursing · crusing · curisng · currsing · cursign · cursingg · cursinng · cursnig

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "cumming" and "cursing" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (/ˈkʌmɪŋ/ versus /ˈkɝsɪŋ/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary English text, does "cumming" or "cursing" show up more?
"cursing" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #19,304 in our English list, against #22,051 for "cumming". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "cumming" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "cursing" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #259,226 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "cumming" and "cursing" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "comming vs cumming". 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 #259,226 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