Which to use
“loath” is an adjective and “lough” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #43,241
- “loath” frequency rank
- #35,390
- “lough” frequency rank
- 78631
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | loath | lough |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Averse, disinclined; reluctant, unwilling. Always followed by a verbal phrase. | A lake or long, narrow inlet, especially in Ireland. |
Where the eye mixes loath and lough
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. loath and lough follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVVCC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.
Look-alike desk: loath vs lough
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: loath is /ləʊθ/ while lough is /lɑx/. 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 (adjective vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 78631, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
loath is recorded at frequency rank #43,241, classified as anadj, pronounced /ləʊθ/. lough is at rank #35,390, tagged as anoun, pronounced /lɑx/.
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 78631, this pair ranks #24,119 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of loath vs lough
Shared letters: hlo. Private to "loath": at. Private to "lough": gu.
"loath" · 5 letters · shape CVVCC · "lough" · 5 letters · shape CVVCC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "loath" and "lough" mean the same thing in a sentence?
In ordinary English text, does "loath" or "lough" show up more?
After this comparison
Eye-level mix-up between "loath" and "lough" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.
- Full dictionary entry for "loath" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "lough" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #24,119 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "loath" and "lough" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "loath vs LSAT". 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 #24,119 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.