Which to use
“leek” is a noun and “leery” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #34,158
- “leek” frequency rank
- #48,321
- “leery” frequency rank
- 82479
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | leek | leery |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | A vegetable of variety Allium ampeloprasum, having edible leaves and an onion-like bulb but with a milder flavour than the onion. | Cautious, suspicious, wary, hesitant, or nervous about something; having reservations or concerns. |
Where the eye mixes leek and leery
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. leek runs 4 letters (CVVC) against leery's 5 (CVVCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Visual trap between leek and leery
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: leek is /liːk/ while leery is /ˈlɪəɹi/. 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 adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 82479, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
leek is recorded at frequency rank #34,158, classified as anoun, pronounced /liːk/. leery is at rank #48,321, tagged as anadj, pronounced /ˈlɪəɹi/.
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 82479, this pair ranks #15,652 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of leek vs leery
Shared letters: el. Private to "leek": k. Private to "leery": ry.
"leek" · 4 letters · shape CVVC · "leery" · 5 letters · shape CVVCV
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Can "leek" and "leery" be used interchangeably?
Which is more common, "leek" or "leery"?
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 "leek" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "leery" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #15,652 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "leek" and "leery" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "leery vs lepers". 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 #15,652 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.