electricalvselectricallyWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: electrical is a adjective, electrically is an adverb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“electrical” is an adjective and “electrically” is an adverb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#3,485
“electrical” frequency rank
#22,656
“electrically” frequency rank
26141
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature electrical electrically
Definition Related to electricity (or electronics) By means of electricity.

Letter map: electrical vs electrically

Shared letters muted; letters that set electrical and electrically apart highlighted. Shared run: 10.

10 ch
electrical
12 ch
electrically

Role in the sentence - electrical and electrically

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: electrical is anadjective and electricallyanadverb. On the page they differ by 2 extra letter(s) - “electrical” sits inside “electrically”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 26141, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

electrical is recorded at frequency rank #3,485, classified as anadj, pronounced /ɪˈlɛktɹɪkəl/. electrically is at rank #22,656, tagged as anadv.

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 26141, this pair ranks #388,894 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of electrical vs electrically

Shared letters: aceilrt. Private to "electrical": -. Private to "electrically": y.

"electrical" · 10 letters · shape VCVCCCVCVC  ·  "electrically" · 12 letters · shape VCVCCCVCVCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • electricaleelctrical · elcetrical · elecctrical · elecrtical · electircal · electrcial · electriacl · electricall
  • electricallyeelctrically · elcetrically · elecctrically · elecrtically · electircally · electrcially · electriaclly · electricallyy

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "electrical" and "electrically" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "electrical" is an adjective and "electrically" an adverb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "electrical" or "electrically"?
"electrical" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #3,485 in our English list, against #22,656 for "electrically". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Pair "electrical" vs "electrically" is on the table, pick a follow-up below.

  • Full dictionary entry for "electrical" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "electrically" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #388,894 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "electrical" and "electrically" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "electrical vs electrics". 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 #388,894 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list