Which to use
“managed” and “manages” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #1,797
- “managed” frequency rank
- #7,813
- “manages” frequency rank
- 9610
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | managed | manages |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | simple past and past participle of manage | third-person singular simple present indicative of manage |
Where the eye mixes managed and manages
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 6 letters in sequence.
Look-alike desk: managed vs manages
A purely visual mix-up. managed (/ˈmæn.ɪd͡ʒd/) and manages (/ˈmæn.ɪ.d͡ʒɪz/) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by a single letter - d in “managed” becomes s in “manages”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 9610, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
managed is recorded at frequency rank #1,797, classified as averb, pronounced /ˈmæn.ɪd͡ʒd/. manages is at rank #7,813, tagged as averb, pronounced /ˈmæn.ɪ.d͡ʒɪz/.
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 9610, this pair ranks #496,497 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of managed vs manages
Shared letters: aegmn. Private to "managed": d. Private to "manages": s.
"managed" · 7 letters · shape CVCVCVC · "manages" · 7 letters · shape CVCVCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "managed" and "manages" mean the same thing in a sentence?
Which is more common, "managed" or "manages"?
Useful next steps
Eye-level mix-up between "managed" and "manages" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.
- Full dictionary entry for "managed" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "manages" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #496,497 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "managed" and "manages" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "mages vs manages". 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 #496,497 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.