Which to use
“mirth” and “mouth” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #46,070
- “mirth” frequency rank
- #1,569
- “mouth” frequency rank
- 47639
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | mirth | mouth |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | The emotion usually following humor and accompanied by laughter. | The front opening of a creature through which food is ingested. |
Where the eye mixes mirth and mouth
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. mirth (CVCCC) and mouth (CVVCC) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.
Why the eye confuses mirth with mouth
A purely visual mix-up. mirth (/mɜɹθ/) and mouth (/maʊθ/) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 47639, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
mirth is recorded at frequency rank #46,070, classified as anoun, pronounced /mɜɹθ/. mouth is at rank #1,569, tagged as anoun, pronounced /maʊθ/.
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 47639, this pair ranks #200,560 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of mirth vs mouth
Shared letters: hmt. Private to "mirth": ir. Private to "mouth": ou.
"mirth" · 5 letters · shape CVCCC · "mouth" · 5 letters · shape CVVCC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "mirth" and "mouth" mean the same thing in a sentence?
In ordinary English text, does "mirth" or "mouth" show up more?
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 "mirth" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "mouth" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #200,560 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "mirth" and "mouth" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "mirth vs myrrh". 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 #200,560 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.