Which to use
“dole” is a verb and “droll” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #18,808
- “dole” frequency rank
- #48,203
- “droll” frequency rank
- 67011
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | dole | droll |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | To distribute in small amounts; to share out small portions of a meager resource. | Oddly humorous; whimsical, amusing in a quaint way; waggish. |
Where the eye mixes dole and droll
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.
Why the eye confuses dole with droll
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: dole is /dəʊl/ while droll is /dɹəʊl/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (verb vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 67011, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
dole is recorded at frequency rank #18,808, classified as averb, pronounced /dəʊl/. droll is at rank #48,203, tagged as anadj, pronounced /dɹəʊl/.
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 67011, this pair ranks #65,359 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of dole vs droll
Shared letters: dlo. Private to "dole": e. Private to "droll": r.
"dole" · 4 letters · shape CVCV · "droll" · 5 letters · shape CCVCC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "dole" and "droll" mean the same thing in a sentence?
In ordinary English text, does "dole" or "droll" show up more?
Useful next steps
Eye-level mix-up between "dole" and "droll" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.
- Full dictionary entry for "dole" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "droll" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #65,359 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "dole" and "droll" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "dol vs droll". 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 #65,359 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.