Which to use
“nervous” is an adjective and “nervously” is an adverb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #3,513
- “nervous” frequency rank
- #20,441
- “nervously” frequency rank
- 23954
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | nervous | nervously |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Of sinews and tendons. | In a nervous manner; feeling or displaying nervousness. |
Letter map: nervous vs nervously
Shared letters muted; letters that set nervous and nervously apart highlighted. Shared run: 7. nervous runs 7 letters (CVCCVVC) against nervously's 9 (CVCCVVCCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Role in the sentence - nervous and nervously
Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: nervous is anadjective and nervouslyanadverb. On the page they differ by 2 extra letter(s) - “nervous” sits inside “nervously”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 23954, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
nervous is recorded at frequency rank #3,513, classified as anadj, pronounced /ˈnɜːvəs/. nervously is at rank #20,441, tagged as anadv.
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 23954, this pair ranks #405,571 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of nervous vs nervously
Shared letters: enorsuv. Private to "nervous": -. Private to "nervously": ly.
"nervous" · 7 letters · shape CVCCVVC · "nervously" · 9 letters · shape CVCCVVCCV
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "nervous" for "nervously" ever safe?
In ordinary English text, does "nervous" or "nervously" show up more?
After this comparison
You've compared "nervous" and "nervously". Here's where to go from here.
- Full dictionary entry for "nervous" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "nervously" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #405,571 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "nervous" and "nervously" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "nerves vs nervous". 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 #405,571 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.