Which to use
“plaid” is a noun and “played” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #18,918
- “plaid” frequency rank
- #590
- “played” frequency rank
- 19508
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | plaid | played |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | A type of twilled woollen cloth, often with a tartan or chequered pattern. | simple past and past participle of play |
Where the eye mixes plaid and played
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence.
Visual trap between plaid and played
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: plaid is /pled/ while played is /pleɪd/. 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 (noun vs verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 19508, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
plaid is recorded at frequency rank #18,918, classified as anoun, pronounced /pled/. played is at rank #590, tagged as averb, pronounced /pleɪd/.
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 19508, this pair ranks #437,675 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of plaid vs played
Shared letters: adlp. Private to "plaid": i. Private to "played": ey.
"plaid" · 5 letters · shape CCVVC · "played" · 6 letters · shape CCVVVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "plaid" for "played" ever safe?
Frequency check: "plaid" vs "played" - which ranks higher?
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 "plaid" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "played" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #437,675 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "plaid" and "played" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "plaid vs plied". 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 #437,675 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.