piecevspiecesWhat's the difference?

Which to use

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

#975
“piece” frequency rank
#1,957
“pieces” frequency rank
2932
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature piece pieces
Definition A part of a larger whole, usually in such a form that it is able to be separated from other parts. plural of piece

Where the eye mixes piece and pieces

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence.

5 ch
piece
6 ch
pieces

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

A purely visual mix-up. piece (/piːs/) and pieces (/ˈpiːsɪz/) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 1 extra letter(s) - “piece” sits inside “pieces”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 2932, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

piece is recorded at frequency rank #975, classified as anoun, pronounced /piːs/. pieces is at rank #1,957, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ˈpiːsɪz/.

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 2932, this pair ranks #523,605 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of piece vs pieces

Shared letters: ceip. Private to "piece": -. Private to "pieces": s.

"piece" · 5 letters · shape CVVCV  ·  "pieces" · 6 letters · shape CVVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • pieceipece · peice · picee · piecce · pieec · ppiece
  • piecesipeces · peices · picees · piecces · piecess · piecse · pieecs · ppieces

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "piece" and "pieces" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently (/piːs/ versus /ˈpiːsɪz/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "piece" or "pieces"?
"piece" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #975 in our English list, against #1,957 for "pieces". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list