pedalsvsperilsWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

“pedals” and “perils” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#21,612
“pedals” frequency rank
#25,169
“perils” frequency rank
46781
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature pedals perils
Definition plural of pedal plural of peril

Where the eye mixes pedals and perils

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. pedals and perils follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCVCC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

6 ch
pedals
6 ch
perils

Visual trap between pedals and perils

A purely visual mix-up. pedals (/ˈpɛdəlz/) and perils (/ˈpɛɹɪlz/) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 46781, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

pedals is recorded at frequency rank #21,612, classified as anoun, pronounced /ˈpɛdəlz/. perils is at rank #25,169, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ˈpɛɹɪlz/.

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 46781, this pair ranks #208,531 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of pedals vs perils

Shared letters: elps. Private to "pedals": ad. Private to "perils": ir.

"pedals" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCC  ·  "perils" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • pedals ← epdals · pdeals · peadls · pedalls · pedalss · pedasl · peddals · pedlas
  • perils ← eprils · peirls · perills · perilss · perisl · perlis · perrils · pperils

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "pedals" and "perils" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (/ˈpɛdəlz/ versus /ˈpɛɹɪlz/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "pedals" or "perils"?
"pedals" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #21,612 in our English list, against #25,169 for "perils". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Eye-level mix-up between "pedals" and "perils" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "pedals" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "perils" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #208,531 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "pedals" and "perils" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "penile vs perils". 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 #208,531 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