greasyvsgreatWhat's the difference?

Which to use

“greasy” and “great” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#16,036
“greasy” frequency rank
#138
“great” frequency rank
16174
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature greasy great
Definition Having a slippery surface; having a surface covered with grease. Taking much space; large.

Where the eye mixes greasy and great

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence.

6 ch
greasy
5 ch
great

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

A purely visual mix-up. greasy (/ˈɡɹi.si/) and great (/ˈɡɹeɪt/) 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 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 16174, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

greasy is recorded at frequency rank #16,036, classified as anadj, pronounced /ˈɡɹi.si/. great is at rank #138, tagged as anadj, pronounced /ˈɡɹeɪt/.

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 16174, this pair ranks #459,431 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of greasy vs great

Shared letters: aegr. Private to "greasy": sy. Private to "great": t.

"greasy" · 6 letters · shape CCVVCV  ·  "great" · 5 letters · shape CCVVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • greasygerasy · ggreasy · graesy · greassy · greasyy · greays · gresay · grreasy
  • greatgerat · ggreat · graet · greatt · grreat · rgeat

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "greasy" and "great" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently (/ˈɡɹi.si/ versus /ˈɡɹeɪt/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "greasy" or "great"?
"great" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #138 in our English list, against #16,036 for "greasy". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list