Which to use
“darken” and “darted” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #33,602
- “darken” frequency rank
- #48,174
- “darted” frequency rank
- 81776
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | darken | darted |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | To make dark or darker by reducing light. | simple past and past participle of dart |
Where the eye mixes darken and darted
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. darken and darted follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCCVC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.
Look-alike desk: darken vs darted
A purely visual mix-up. darken (/ˈdɑɹkən/) and darted (/ˈdɑɹtɪd/) 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 81776, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
darken is recorded at frequency rank #33,602, classified as averb, pronounced /ˈdɑɹkən/. darted is at rank #48,174, tagged as averb, pronounced /ˈdɑɹtɪd/.
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 81776, this pair ranks #17,016 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of darken vs darted
Shared letters: ader. Private to "darken": kn. Private to "darted": t.
"darken" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC · "darted" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "darken" and "darted" mean the same thing in a sentence?
In ordinary English text, does "darken" or "darted" show up more?
Useful next steps
Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.
- Full dictionary entry for "darken" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "darted" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #17,016 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "darken" and "darted" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "darned vs darted". 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 #17,016 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.