livesvslopesWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: lives is a verb, lopes is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“lives” is a verb and “lopes” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#748
“lives” frequency rank
#44,310
“lopes” frequency rank
45058
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature lives lopes
Definition third-person singular simple present indicative of live plural of lope

Where the eye mixes lives and lopes

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.

5 ch
lives
5 ch
lopes

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: lives is /lɪvz/ while lopes is /loʊps/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (verb vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 45058, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

lives is recorded at frequency rank #748, classified as averb, pronounced /lɪvz/. lopes is at rank #44,310, tagged as anoun, pronounced /loʊps/.

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 45058, this pair ranks #224,789 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of lives vs lopes

Shared letters: els. Private to "lives": iv. Private to "lopes": op.

"lives" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC  ·  "lopes" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • livesilves · lievs · livess · livse · livves · llives · lvies
  • lopesllopes · loeps · lopess · loppes · lopse · lpoes · olpes

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "lives" and "lopes" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "lives" is a verb and "lopes" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "lives" or "lopes"?
"lives" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #748 in our English list, against #44,310 for "lopes". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list