Which to use
“laborer” is a noun and “laboured” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #33,304
- “laborer” frequency rank
- #42,738
- “laboured” frequency rank
- 76042
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | laborer | laboured |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | One who labors. | simple past and past participle of labour |
Where the eye mixes laborer and laboured
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 6 letters in sequence. laborer runs 7 letters (CVCVCVC) against laboured's 8 (CVCVVCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Visual trap between laborer and laboured
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: laborer is /ˈleɪ.bɚ.ɹɚ/ while laboured is /ˈleɪ.bɚd/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 76042, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
laborer is recorded at frequency rank #33,304, classified as anoun, pronounced /ˈleɪ.bɚ.ɹɚ/. laboured is at rank #42,738, tagged as averb, pronounced /ˈleɪ.bɚd/.
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 76042, this pair ranks #31,240 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of laborer vs laboured
Shared letters: abelor. Private to "laborer": -. Private to "laboured": du.
"laborer" · 7 letters · shape CVCVCVC · "laboured" · 8 letters · shape CVCVVCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "laborer" for "laboured" ever safe?
In ordinary English text, does "laborer" or "laboured" show up more?
Useful next steps
Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.
- Full dictionary entry for "laborer" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "laboured" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #31,240 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "laborer" and "laboured" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "laboured vs labours". 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 #31,240 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.