kilosvsKosTell them apart

Quick tell: kilos is a noun, Kos is a name, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“kilos” is a noun and “Kos” is a name - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#20,980
“kilos” frequency rank
#27,534
“Kos” frequency rank
48514
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature kilos Kos
Definition plural of kilo An island of the Dodecanese, Greece.

Letter map: kilos vs Kos

Shared letters muted; letters that set kilos and Kos apart highlighted. Shared run: 3.

5 ch
kilos
3 ch
Kos

Part-of-speech tell for kilos / Kos

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: kilos is anoun and Kosaname. On the page they differ by 2 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 48514, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

kilos is recorded at frequency rank #20,980, classified as anoun, pronounced /ˈkiːləʊz/. Kos is at rank #27,534, 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 48514, this pair ranks #192,332 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of kilos vs Kos

Shared letters: kos. Private to "kilos": il. Private to "Kos": -.

"kilos" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC  ·  "Kos" · 3 letters · shape CVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • kilosiklos · killos · kiloss · kilso · kiols · kkilos · klios

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "kilos" and "Kos" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "kilos" is a noun and "Kos" a name, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "kilos" vs "Kos" - which ranks higher?
"kilos" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #20,980 in our English list, against #27,534 for "Kos". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Pair "kilos" vs "Kos" is on the table, pick a follow-up below.

  • Full dictionary entry for "kilos" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "Kos" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #192,332 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "kilos" and "Kos" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Kop vs Kos". 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 #192,332 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