Which to use
“land” and “loan” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #608
- “land” frequency rank
- #2,118
- “loan” frequency rank
- 2726
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | land | loan |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | The part of Earth which is not covered by oceans or other bodies of water. | An act or instance of lending, an act or instance of granting something for temporary use. |
Where the eye mixes land and loan
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
A purely visual mix-up. land (/lænd/) and loan (/ləʊn/) 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 3 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 2726, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
land is recorded at frequency rank #608, classified as anoun, pronounced /lænd/. loan is at rank #2,118, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ləʊn/.
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 2726, this pair ranks #524,200 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of land vs loan
Shared letters: aln. Private to "land": d. Private to "loan": o.
"land" · 4 letters · shape CVCC · "loan" · 4 letters · shape CVVC