Which to use
“gills” and “gully” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #26,803
- “gills” frequency rank
- #25,079
- “gully” frequency rank
- 51882
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | gills | gully |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | plural of gill | A trench, ravine or narrow channel which was worn by water flow, especially on a hillside. |
Where the eye mixes gills and gully
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. gills (CVCCC) and gully (CVCCV) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.
Look-alike desk: gills vs gully
A purely visual mix-up. gills (/ɡɪlz/) and gully (/ˈɡʌli/) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 51882, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
gills is recorded at frequency rank #26,803, classified as anoun, pronounced /ɡɪlz/. gully is at rank #25,079, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ˈɡʌli/.
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 51882, this pair ranks #161,682 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of gills vs gully
Shared letters: gl. Private to "gills": is. Private to "gully": uy.
"gills" · 5 letters · shape CVCCC · "gully" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "gills" for "gully" ever safe?
Frequency check: "gills" vs "gully" - which ranks higher?
After this comparison
Eye-level mix-up between "gills" and "gully" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.
- Full dictionary entry for "gills" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "gully" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #161,682 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "gills" and "gully" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "gills vs gilly". 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 #161,682 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.