Which to use
“ironed” is an adjective and “irons” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #32,047
- “ironed” frequency rank
- #19,115
- “irons” frequency rank
- 51162
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | ironed | irons |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Proivided with, or strengthened by, iron; shod with iron. | plural of iron |
Letter map: ironed vs irons
Shared letters muted; letters that set ironed and irons apart highlighted. Shared run: 4. ironed runs 6 letters (VCVCVC) against irons's 5 (VCVCC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Role in the sentence - ironed and irons
Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: ironed is anadjective and ironsanoun. On the page they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 51162, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
ironed is recorded at frequency rank #32,047, classified as anadj. irons is at rank #19,115, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ˈaɪ.ənz/.
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 51162, this pair ranks #167,857 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of ironed vs irons
Shared letters: inor. Private to "ironed": de. Private to "irons": s.
"ironed" · 6 letters · shape VCVCVC · "irons" · 5 letters · shape VCVCC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "ironed" for "irons" ever safe?
In ordinary English text, does "ironed" or "irons" show up more?
What to do next
You've compared "ironed" and "irons". Here's where to go from here.
- Full dictionary entry for "ironed" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "irons" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #167,857 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "ironed" and "irons" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "irked vs ironed". 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 #167,857 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.