Which to use
“ease” and “east” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #4,015
- “ease” frequency rank
- #709
- “east” frequency rank
- 4724
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | ease | east |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Lack of difficulty; the ability to do something easily. | The direction of the earth's rotation, specifically 90°. |
Where the eye mixes ease and east
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
A purely visual mix-up. ease (/iːz/) and east (/iːst/) 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 a single letter - e in “ease” becomes t in “east”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 4724, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
ease is recorded at frequency rank #4,015, classified as anoun, pronounced /iːz/. east is at rank #709, tagged as anoun, pronounced /iːst/.
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 4724, this pair ranks #517,906 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of ease vs east
Shared letters: aes. Private to "ease": -. Private to "east": t.
"ease" · 4 letters · shape VVCV · "east" · 4 letters · shape VVCC