Which to use
“don” and “downs” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #2,480
- “don” frequency rank
- #7,914
- “downs” frequency rank
- 10394
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | don | downs |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | A university professor, particularly one at Oxford or Cambridge. | plural of down |
Where the eye mixes don and downs
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.
Visual trap between don and downs
A purely visual mix-up. don (/dɒn/) and downs (/daʊnz/) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 2 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 10394, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
don is recorded at frequency rank #2,480, classified as anoun, pronounced /dɒn/. downs is at rank #7,914, tagged as anoun, pronounced /daʊnz/.
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 10394, this pair ranks #492,573 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of don vs downs
Shared letters: dno. Private to "don": -. Private to "downs": sw.
"don" · 3 letters · shape CVC · "downs" · 5 letters · shape CVCCC
Known mistypes of this pair
- downs ← ddowns · donws · downns · downss · dowsn · dowwns · dwons · odwns
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "don" for "downs" ever safe?
Frequency check: "don" vs "downs" - which ranks higher?
Useful next steps
Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.
- Full dictionary entry for "don" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "downs" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #492,573 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "don" and "downs" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Downie vs downs". 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 #492,573 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.