Which to use
“near” is an adjective and “ned” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #514
- “near” frequency rank
- #11,076
- “ned” frequency rank
- 11590
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | near | ned |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Physically close. | A person, usually a youth, of low social standing and education, a violent disposition and with a particular style of dress (typically sportswear or Burberry), speech and behaviour. |
Where the eye mixes near and ned
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.
Look-alike desk: near vs ned
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: near is /nɪə/ while ned is /nɛd/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (adjective vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 11590, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
near is recorded at frequency rank #514, classified as anadj, pronounced /nɪə/. ned is at rank #11,076, tagged as anoun, pronounced /nɛd/.
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 11590, this pair ranks #486,220 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of near vs ned
Shared letters: en. Private to "near": ar. Private to "ned": d.
"near" · 4 letters · shape CVVC · "ned" · 3 letters · shape CVC
Known mistypes of this pair
- near ← enar · naer · nearr · nera · nnear
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "near" for "ned" ever safe?
Frequency check: "near" vs "ned" - which ranks higher?
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 "near" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "ned" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #486,220 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "near" and "ned" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "ned vs NPL". 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 #486,220 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.