Which to use
“dear” is an adjective and “door” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #1,753
- “dear” frequency rank
- #869
- “door” frequency rank
- 2622
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | dear | door |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | High in price; expensive. | A portal of entry into a building, room, or vehicle, typically consisting of a rigid plane movable on a hinge. It may have a handle to help open and close, a latch to hold it closed, and a lock that ensures it cannot be opened without a key. |
Where the eye mixes dear and door
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: dear is /dɪə/ while door is /do(ː)ɹ/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (adjective vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 2622, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
dear is recorded at frequency rank #1,753, classified as anadj, pronounced /dɪə/. door is at rank #869, tagged as anoun, pronounced /do(ː)ɹ/.
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 2622, this pair ranks #524,498 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of dear vs door
Shared letters: dr. Private to "dear": ae. Private to "door": o.
"dear" · 4 letters · shape CVVC · "door" · 4 letters · shape CVVC