Plough or plow?
plough is a noun meaning “A device pulled through the ground in order to break it open into furrows for…”; plow is a noun meaning “Alternative spelling of plough”. Wiktionary gives them as spellings of the same word. In written English (wordfreq, 2021 data) plow is about as common as plough.
What is the difference between plough and plow?
| plough | plow | |
|---|---|---|
| Part of speech | noun, verb | noun, verb |
| Meaning | A device pulled through the ground in order to break it open into furrows for planting A joiner's plane for making grooves To use a plough on soil to prepare for planting | USAlternative spelling of plough |
| Example | Meronyms: ploughshare, plowshare, share, moldboard, mouldboard, coulter, colter, jointer, chisel, ploughbeam, beam, ploughstaff, staff, hake | Trucks plowed through the water to ferry flood victims to safety |
| Forms | ploughs | plows |
| Pronunciation | /plaʊ/ /plæɔ/ /plæʊ/ | /plaʊ/ |
| In writing | 1.2 times per million words | 1.6 times per million words |
Sources: plough and plow in the English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0); written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
Every current meaning of plough and plow
plough
- 1
A device pulled through the ground in order to break it open into furrows for planting
Meronyms: ploughshare, plowshare, share, moldboard, mouldboard, coulter, colter, jointer, chisel, ploughbeam, beam, ploughstaff, staff, hake
- 2
To use a plough on soil to prepare for planting
I've still got to plough that field
- 3
Ellipsis of snowplough
It's been three hours since a plough came through here, and now you can hardly even tell that it did! [the snow keeps falling heavily]
- 4
To use a plough
Some days I have to plough from sunrise to sunset
- 5
A joiner's plane for making grooves
- 6
To move with force
Trucks ploughed through the water to ferry flood victims to safety
- 7
A bookbinder's implement for trimming or shaving off the edges of books
- 8
colloquialTo knock over or run over (someone) without stopping
My brother ploughed me over
plow
- 1
USAlternative spelling of plough
- 2
USAlternative spelling of plough
Trucks plowed through the water to ferry flood victims to safety
Source: the English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0); obsolete, archaic, dialect and rare senses left out.
Which is more common, plough or plow?
plough appears 1.2 times per million words; plow 1.6 times per million words.
plough 1.2 times per million wordsplow 1.6 times per million words
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
How many people search plough vs plow?
“plough vs plow” is searched about 480 times a month on Google and 40 on Bing in the United States. Google counts close variants of a query together (“plow vs plough”, “plough or plow”).
Sources: Google Ads keyword data through DataForSEO and Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, the average month from September 2025 to August 2026.