Which to use
“lemur” and “leper” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #48,861
- “lemur” frequency rank
- #37,540
- “leper” frequency rank
- 86401
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | lemur | leper |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Any strepsirrhine primate of the superfamily Lemuroidea, native only to Madagascar and some surrounding islands. | A person who has leprosy, a person suffering from Hansen's disease. |
Where the eye mixes lemur and leper
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. lemur and leper follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCVC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.
Look-alike desk: lemur vs leper
A purely visual mix-up. lemur (/ˈliːmə(ɹ)/) and leper (/ˈlɛpɚ/) 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 86401, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
lemur is recorded at frequency rank #48,861, classified as anoun, pronounced /ˈliːmə(ɹ)/. leper is at rank #37,540, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ˈlɛpɚ/.
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 86401, this pair ranks #9,013 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of lemur vs leper
Shared letters: elr. Private to "lemur": mu. Private to "leper": p.
"lemur" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC · "leper" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "lemur" for "leper" ever safe?
Which is more common, "lemur" or "leper"?
After this comparison
Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.
- Full dictionary entry for "lemur" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "leper" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #9,013 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "lemur" and "leper" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "leer vs lemur". 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 #9,013 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.