Which to use
“likes” is a noun and “lives” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #1,907
- “likes” frequency rank
- #748
- “lives” frequency rank
- 2655
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | likes | lives |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | plural of like | third-person singular simple present indicative of live |
Where the eye mixes likes and lives
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. likes and lives follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCVC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.
Look-alike desk: likes vs lives
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: likes is /laɪks/ while lives is /lɪvz/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by a single letter - k in “likes” becomes v in “lives”, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 2655, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
likes is recorded at frequency rank #1,907, classified as anoun, pronounced /laɪks/. lives is at rank #748, tagged as averb, pronounced /lɪvz/.
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 2655, this pair ranks #524,403 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of likes vs lives
Shared letters: eils. Private to "likes": k. Private to "lives": v.
"likes" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC · "lives" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Can "likes" and "lives" be used interchangeably?
In ordinary English text, does "likes" or "lives" show up more?
What to do next
Eye-level mix-up between "likes" and "lives" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.
- Full dictionary entry for "likes" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "lives" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #524,403 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "likes" and "lives" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "likes vs linker". 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 #524,403 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.