nosedvsnoteConfusable pair

Quick tell: nosed is a verb, note is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“nosed” is a verb and “note” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#24,256
“nosed” frequency rank
#973
“note” frequency rank
25229
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature nosed note
Definition simple past and past participle of nose A symbol or annotation.

Where the eye mixes nosed and note

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

5 ch
nosed
4 ch
note

Look-alike desk: nosed vs note

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: nosed is /nəʊ̯zd/ while note is /nəʊt/. 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 (verb vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 25229, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

nosed is recorded at frequency rank #24,256, classified as averb, pronounced /nəʊ̯zd/. note is at rank #973, tagged as anoun, pronounced /nəʊt/.

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 25229, this pair ranks #395,927 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of nosed vs note

Shared letters: eno. Private to "nosed": ds. Private to "note": t.

"nosed" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC  ·  "note" · 4 letters · shape CVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • nosednnosed · noesd · nosde · nosedd · nossed · nsoed · onsed
  • notennote · noet · notte · ntoe · onte

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "nosed" for "note" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "nosed" is a verb and "note" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary English text, does "nosed" or "note" show up more?
"note" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #973 in our English list, against #24,256 for "nosed". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

What to do next

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "nosed" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "note" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #395,927 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "nosed" and "note" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "nosed vs Noyes". 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 #395,927 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