Which to use
“grosser” is an adjective and “grossly” is an adverb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #49,370
- “grosser” frequency rank
- #18,841
- “grossly” frequency rank
- 68211
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | grosser | grossly |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | comparative form of gross: more gross | Greatly; to a large degree, especially one large enough to be frankly appreciable. |
Letter map: grosser vs grossly
Shared letters muted; letters that set grosser and grossly apart highlighted. Shared run: 5. grosser (CCVCCVC) and grossly (CCVCCCV) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.
Role in the sentence - grosser and grossly
Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: grosser is anadjective and grosslyanadverb. On the page they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 68211, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
grosser is recorded at frequency rank #49,370, classified as anadj. grossly is at rank #18,841, tagged as anadv, pronounced /ˈɡɹoʊsli/.
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 68211, this pair ranks #59,909 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of grosser vs grossly
Shared letters: gors. Private to "grosser": e. Private to "grossly": ly.
"grosser" · 7 letters · shape CCVCCVC · "grossly" · 7 letters · shape CCVCCCV
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "grosser" for "grossly" ever safe?
Which is more common, "grosser" or "grossly"?
Useful next steps
You've compared "grosser" and "grossly". Here's where to go from here.
- Full dictionary entry for "grosser" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "grossly" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #59,909 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "grosser" and "grossly" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "grasse vs grosser". 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 #59,909 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.