dealtvsDeaneTell them apart

Quick tell: dealt is a verb, Deane is a name, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“dealt” is a verb and “Deane” is a name - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#5,115
“dealt” frequency rank
#33,606
“Deane” frequency rank
38721
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature dealt Deane
Definition simple past and past participle of deal A surname from Middle English, a variant of Dean.

Letter map: dealt vs Deane

Shared letters muted; letters that set dealt and Deane apart highlighted. Shared run: 3. dealt (CVVCC) and Deane (CVVCV) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.

5 ch
dealt
5 ch
Deane

Part-of-speech tell for dealt / Deane

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: dealt is averb and Deaneaname. On the page they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 38721, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

dealt is recorded at frequency rank #5,115, classified as averb, pronounced /ˈdɛlt/. Deane is at rank #33,606, tagged as aname.

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 38721, this pair ranks #283,396 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of dealt vs Deane

Shared letters: ade. Private to "dealt": lt. Private to "Deane": n.

"dealt" · 5 letters · shape CVVCC  ·  "Deane" · 5 letters · shape CVVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • dealt ← daelt · ddealt · deallt · dealtt · deatl · delat · edalt
  • Deane ← daene · ddeane · deaen · deanne · denae · edane

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "dealt" and "Deane" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "dealt" is a verb and "Deane" a name, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary English text, does "dealt" or "Deane" show up more?
"dealt" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #5,115 in our English list, against #33,606 for "Deane". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Pair "dealt" vs "Deane" is on the table, pick a follow-up below.

  • Full dictionary entry for "dealt" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "Deane" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #283,396 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "dealt" and "Deane" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Deane vs drape". 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 #283,396 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