mendvsmuddTell them apart

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

Which to use

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

#18,888
“mend” frequency rank
#48,367
“mudd” frequency rank
67255
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature mend mudd
Definition To physically repair (something that is broken, defaced, decayed, torn, or otherwise damaged). Obsolete spelling of mud.

Letter map: mend vs mudd

Shared letters muted; letters that set mend and mudd apart highlighted. Shared run: 2.

4 ch
mend
4 ch
mudd

Part-of-speech tell for mend / mudd

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: mend is averb and muddanoun. On the page they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 67255, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

mend is recorded at frequency rank #18,888, classified as averb, pronounced /mɛnd/. mudd is at rank #48,367, tagged as anoun.

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 67255, this pair ranks #64,192 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of mend vs mudd

Shared letters: dm. Private to "mend": en. Private to "mudd": u.

"mend" · 4 letters · shape CVCC  ·  "mudd" · 4 letters · shape CVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • mendemnd · medn · mendd · mennd · mmend · mned
  • muddmdud · mmudd · umdd

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "mend" and "mudd" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "mend" is a verb and "mudd" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "mend" vs "mudd" - which ranks higher?
"mend" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #18,888 in our English list, against #48,367 for "mudd". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Pair "mend" vs "mudd" is on the table, pick a follow-up below.

  • Full dictionary entry for "mend" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "mudd" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #64,192 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "mend" and "mudd" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "muda vs mudd". 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 #64,192 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list