Which to use
“ours” is a pronoun and “oust” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #5,527
- “ours” frequency rank
- #31,281
- “oust” frequency rank
- 36808
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | ours | oust |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | That or those belonging to us. | To expel; to remove. |
Where the eye mixes ours and oust
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. ours and oust follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (VVCC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.
Look-alike desk: ours vs oust
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: ours is /ˈaʊəz/ while oust is /aʊst/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (pronoun vs verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 36808, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
ours is recorded at frequency rank #5,527, classified as apron, pronounced /ˈaʊəz/. oust is at rank #31,281, tagged as averb, pronounced /aʊst/.
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 36808, this pair ranks #299,983 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of ours vs oust
Shared letters: osu. Private to "ours": r. Private to "oust": t.
"ours" · 4 letters · shape VVCC · "oust" · 4 letters · shape VVCC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "ours" and "oust" mean the same thing in a sentence?
Which is more common, "ours" or "oust"?
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 "ours" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "oust" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #299,983 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "ours" and "oust" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "oust vs OWS". 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 #299,983 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.