Which to use
“marched” is a verb and “marches” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #10,395
- “marched” frequency rank
- #16,746
- “marches” frequency rank
- 27141
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | marched | marches |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | simple past and past participle of march | plural of march |
Where the eye mixes marched and marches
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 6 letters in sequence. marched and marches follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCCCVC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.
Visual trap between marched and marches
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: marched is /mɑɹt͡ʃt/ while marches is /ˈmɑɹt͡ʃɪz/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by a single letter - d in “marched” becomes s in “marches”, and the parts of speech differ too (verb vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 27141, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
marched is recorded at frequency rank #10,395, classified as averb, pronounced /mɑɹt͡ʃt/. marches is at rank #16,746, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ˈmɑɹt͡ʃɪz/.
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 27141, this pair ranks #381,270 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of marched vs marches
Shared letters: acehmr. Private to "marched": d. Private to "marches": s.
"marched" · 7 letters · shape CVCCCVC · "marches" · 7 letters · shape CVCCCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "marched" for "marches" ever safe?
Which is more common, "marched" or "marches"?
Useful next steps
Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.
- Full dictionary entry for "marched" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "marches" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #381,270 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "marched" and "marches" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "marbled vs marched". 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 #381,270 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.