Which to use
“land” and “lead” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #608
- “land” frequency rank
- #636
- “lead” frequency rank
- 1244
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | land | lead |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | The part of Earth which is not covered by oceans or other bodies of water. | A heavy, pliable, inelastic metal element, having a bright, bluish color, but easily tarnished; both malleable and ductile, though with little tenacity. It is easily fusible, forms alloys with other metals, and is an ingredient of solder and type metal. Atomic number 82, symbol Pb (from Latin plumbum). |
Where the eye mixes land and lead
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
A purely visual mix-up. land (/lænd/) and lead (/lɛd/) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 1244, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
land is recorded at frequency rank #608, classified as anoun, pronounced /lænd/. lead is at rank #636, tagged as anoun, pronounced /lɛd/.
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 1244, this pair ranks #527,805 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of land vs lead
Shared letters: adl. Private to "land": n. Private to "lead": e.
"land" · 4 letters · shape CVCC · "lead" · 4 letters · shape CVVC