mindvsmoundWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

“mind” and “mound” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#378
“mind” frequency rank
#13,021
“mound” frequency rank
13399
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature mind mound
Definition The capability for rational thought. An artificial hill or elevation of earth; a raised bank; an embankment thrown up for defense

Where the eye mixes mind and mound

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

4 ch
mind
5 ch
mound

Why the eye confuses mind with mound

A purely visual mix-up. mind (/maɪnd/) and mound (/maʊnd/) 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 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 13399, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

mind is recorded at frequency rank #378, classified as anoun, pronounced /maɪnd/. mound is at rank #13,021, tagged as anoun, pronounced /maʊnd/.

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 13399, this pair ranks #476,047 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of mind vs mound

Shared letters: dmn. Private to "mind": i. Private to "mound": ou.

"mind" · 4 letters · shape CVCC  ·  "mound" · 5 letters · shape CVVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • mindimnd · midn · mindd · minnd · mmind · mnid
  • moundmmound · monud · moudn · moundd · mounnd · muond · omund

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "mind" and "mound" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (/maɪnd/ versus /maʊnd/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "mind" vs "mound" - which ranks higher?
"mind" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #378 in our English list, against #13,021 for "mound". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

After this comparison

Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.

  • Full dictionary entry for "mind" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "mound" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #476,047 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "mind" and "mound" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "mound 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 #476,047 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