Which to use
“piece” is a noun and “pierced” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #975
- “piece” frequency rank
- #15,882
- “pierced” frequency rank
- 16857
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | piece | pierced |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | A part of a larger whole, usually in such a form that it is able to be separated from other parts. | simple past and past participle of pierce |
Where the eye mixes piece and pierced
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence. piece runs 5 letters (CVVCV) against pierced's 7 (CVVCCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Why the eye confuses piece with pierced
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: piece is /piːs/ while pierced is /pɪɹst/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 2 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 16857, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
piece is recorded at frequency rank #975, classified as anoun, pronounced /piːs/. pierced is at rank #15,882, tagged as averb, pronounced /pɪɹst/.
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 16857, this pair ranks #455,161 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of piece vs pierced
Shared letters: ceip. Private to "piece": -. Private to "pierced": dr.
"piece" · 5 letters · shape CVVCV · "pierced" · 7 letters · shape CVVCCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "piece" and "pierced" mean the same thing in a sentence?
Which is more common, "piece" or "pierced"?
After this comparison
Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.
- Full dictionary entry for "piece" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "pierced" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #455,161 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "piece" and "pierced" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "pecs vs piece". 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 #455,161 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.