nothing vs noticing, What's the Difference?

Which to use

“nothing” is a pronoun and “noticing” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#256
“nothing” frequency rank: #12,288
“noticing” frequency rank: 12544
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature	nothing	noticing
Definition	Not any thing; no thing.	The act by which something is noticed.

Where the spellings diverge

Shared letters are muted; the letters that actually set nothing and noticing apart are highlighted. They share 6 letters in sequence, which is exactly why the eye skips the difference.

7 ch

nothing

8 ch

noticing

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: nothing is /ˈnʌθ.ɪŋ/ while noticing is /ˈnəʊ.tɪ.sɪŋ/. 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 (pronoun vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 12544, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

nothing is recorded at frequency rank #256, classified as apron, pronounced /ˈnʌθ.ɪŋ/. noticing is at rank #12,288, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ˈnəʊ.tɪ.sɪŋ/.

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 12544, this pair ranks #480,948 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of nothing vs noticing

Shared letters: ginot. Private to "nothing": h. Private to "noticing": c.

"nothing" · 7 letters · shape CVCCVCC · "noticing" · 8 letters · shape CVCVCVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

nothing ← nnothing · nohting · nothhing · nothign · nothingg · nothinng · nothnig · notihng
noticing ← nnoticing · noitcing · notciing · noticcing · noticign · noticingg · noticinng · noticnig

Frequency comparison

nothing#256

noticing#12,288

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "nothing" and "noticing" be used interchangeably?

No - they are not even the same part of speech. "nothing" is a pronoun and "noticing" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.

Which is more common, "nothing" or "noticing"?

"nothing" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #256 in our English list, against #12,288 for "noticing". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Remembering nothing vs noticing

The fastest way to pick the right one every time.

Check the role first: if you need a pronoun, it's “nothing”; for a noun, it's “noticing”.
See each word in full, definition, IPA, etymology and its other confusables. Full “nothing” entry
Browse more pairs most likely to be confused. Most confusable