Which to use
“done” is an adjective and “doves” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #236
- “done” frequency rank
- #25,361
- “doves” frequency rank
- 25597
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | done | doves |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Having completed or finished an activity. | plural of dove |
Where the eye mixes done and doves
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.
Why the eye confuses done with doves
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: done is /dʌn/ while doves is /dʌvz/. 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 (adjective vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 25597, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
done is recorded at frequency rank #236, classified as anadj, pronounced /dʌn/. doves is at rank #25,361, tagged as anoun, pronounced /dʌvz/.
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 25597, this pair ranks #393,057 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of done vs doves
Shared letters: deo. Private to "done": n. Private to "doves": sv.
"done" · 4 letters · shape CVCV · "doves" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "done" and "doves" mean the same thing in a sentence?
In ordinary English text, does "done" or "doves" show up more?
What to do next
Eye-level mix-up between "done" and "doves" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.
- Full dictionary entry for "done" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "doves" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #393,057 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "done" and "doves" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "dikes vs doves". 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 #393,057 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.