Which to use
“government” is a noun and “governmental” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #240
- “government” frequency rank
- #8,937
- “governmental” frequency rank
- 9177
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | government | governmental |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | The body with the power to make and/or enforce laws to control a country, land area, people or organization. | Relating to a government. |
Where the spellings diverge
Shared letters are muted; the letters that actually set government and governmental apart are highlighted. They share 10 letters in sequence, which is exactly why the eye skips the difference.
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
government and governmental form a confusable pair in the English index, two distinct headwords that are easily confused because they look alike, sound alike, or both. They differ by 2 extra letter(s) - “government” sits inside “governmental” - close enough that the eye skips over the difference, far enough that meaning fully diverges. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 9177, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
government is recorded at frequency rank #240, classified as anoun, pronounced /ˈɡʌv.ɚ(n).mənt/. governmental is at rank #8,937, tagged as anadj, pronounced /ˌɡʌv(ə)nˈmɛnt(ə)l/.
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 9177, this pair ranks #498,717 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Frequency comparison
Frequently Asked Questions
Can "government" and "governmental" be used interchangeably?
Remembering government vs governmental
The fastest way to pick the right one every time.
- Check the role first: if you need a noun, it's “government”; for an adjective, it's “governmental”.
- See each word in full, definition, IPA, etymology and its other confusables. Full “government” entry
- Browse more pairs most likely to be confused. Most confusable