laudvslaughWhat's the difference?

Which to use

“laud” and “laugh” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#47,152
“laud” frequency rank
#2,214
“laugh” frequency rank
49366
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature laud laugh
Definition Glorification or praise. An expression of mirth particular to the human species; the sound heard in laughing; laughter.

Where the eye mixes laud and laugh

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. laud runs 4 letters (CVVC) against laugh's 5 (CVVCC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

4 ch
laud
5 ch
laugh

Look-alike desk: laud vs laugh

A purely visual mix-up. laud (/lɔːd/) and laugh (/lɐːf/) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 49366, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

laud is recorded at frequency rank #47,152, classified as anoun, pronounced /lɔːd/. laugh is at rank #2,214, tagged as anoun, pronounced /lɐːf/.

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 49366, this pair ranks #184,321 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of laud vs laugh

Shared letters: alu. Private to "laud": d. Private to "laugh": gh.

"laud" · 4 letters · shape CVVC  ·  "laugh" · 5 letters · shape CVVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • laud ← ladu · laudd · llaud · luad
  • laugh ← alugh · laguh · lauggh · laughh · lauhg · llaugh · luagh

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "laud" for "laugh" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (/lɔːd/ versus /lɐːf/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "laud" or "laugh"?
"laugh" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #2,214 in our English list, against #47,152 for "laud". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Useful next steps

Eye-level mix-up between "laud" and "laugh" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "laud" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "laugh" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #184,321 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "laud" and "laugh" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "laud vs lav". 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 #184,321 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