earlyvsearthWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: early is a adjective, earth is a name, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“early” is an adjective and “earth” is a name - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#354
“early” frequency rank
#923
“earth” frequency rank
1277
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature early earth
Definition At a time in advance of the usual or expected event. Alternative letter-case form of Earth; our planet, third out from the Sun.

Letter map: early vs earth

Shared letters muted; letters that set early and earth apart highlighted. Shared run: 3.

5 ch
early
5 ch
earth

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: early is anadjective and earthaname. On the page they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 1277, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

early is recorded at frequency rank #354, classified as anadj. earth is at rank #923, tagged as aname, pronounced /ɜːθ/.

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 1277, this pair ranks #527,737 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of early vs earth

Shared letters: aer. Private to "early": ly. Private to "earth": ht.

"early" · 5 letters · shape VVCCV  ·  "earth" · 5 letters · shape VVCCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • earlyaerly · ealry · earlly · earlyy · earrly · earyl · eraly
  • earthaerth · earht · earrth · earthh · eartth · eatrh · erath

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "early" and "earth" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "early" is an adjective and "earth" a name, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "early" or "earth"?
"early" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #354 in our English list, against #923 for "earth". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list