Which to use
“nightly” is an adjective and “nights” is an adverb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #15,454
- “nightly” frequency rank
- #3,186
- “nights” frequency rank
- 18640
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | nightly | nights |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Happening or appearing in the night; night-time; nocturnal. | At night (during night-time, especially on a regular basis). |
Where the eye mixes nightly and nights
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence. nightly runs 7 letters (CVCCCCV) against nights's 6 (CVCCCC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Look-alike desk: nightly vs nights
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: nightly is /ˈnaɪtli/ while nights is /naɪts/. 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 adverb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 18640, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
nightly is recorded at frequency rank #15,454, classified as anadj, pronounced /ˈnaɪtli/. nights is at rank #3,186, tagged as anadv, pronounced /naɪts/.
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 18640, this pair ranks #443,549 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of nightly vs nights
Shared letters: ghint. Private to "nightly": ly. Private to "nights": s.
"nightly" · 7 letters · shape CVCCCCV · "nights" · 6 letters · shape CVCCCC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "nightly" and "nights" mean the same thing in a sentence?
In ordinary English text, does "nightly" or "nights" show up more?
What to do next
Eye-level mix-up between "nightly" and "nights" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.
- Full dictionary entry for "nightly" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "nights" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #443,549 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "nightly" and "nights" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "nighter vs nightly". 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 #443,549 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.