ilkvsiOSWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: ilk is a adjective, iOS is a name, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“ilk” is an adjective and “iOS” is a name - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#32,443
“ilk” frequency rank
#5,888
“iOS” frequency rank
38331
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature ilk iOS
Definition Very; same. A mobile operating system (OS) created and developed by Apple Inc. exclusively for its hardware.

Letter map: ilk vs iOS

Shared letters muted; letters that set ilk and iOS apart highlighted. Shared run: 1.

3 ch
ilk
3 ch
iOS

Part-of-speech tell for ilk / iOS

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: ilk is anadjective and iOSaname. On the page they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 38331, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

ilk is recorded at frequency rank #32,443, classified as anadj, pronounced /ɪlk/. iOS is at rank #5,888, tagged as aname.

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 38331, this pair ranks #286,840 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of ilk vs iOS

Shared letters: i. Private to "ilk": kl. Private to "iOS": os.

"ilk" · 3 letters · shape VCC  ·  "iOS" · 3 letters · shape VVC

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "ilk" for "iOS" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "ilk" is an adjective and "iOS" a name, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "ilk" vs "iOS" - which ranks higher?
"iOS" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #5,888 in our English list, against #32,443 for "ilk". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

You've compared "ilk" and "iOS". Here's where to go from here.

  • Full dictionary entry for "ilk" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "iOS" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #286,840 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "ilk" and "iOS" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Ilan vs ilk". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #286,840 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