Which to use
“pursuing” is a verb and “pursuit” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #7,598
- “pursuing” frequency rank
- #5,906
- “pursuit” frequency rank
- 13504
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | pursuing | pursuit |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | present participle and gerund of pursue | The act of pursuing. |
Where the eye mixes pursuing and pursuit
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 6 letters in sequence. pursuing runs 8 letters (CVCCVVCC) against pursuit's 7 (CVCCVVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Visual trap between pursuing and pursuit
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: pursuing is /pəˈsjuː.ɪŋ/ while pursuit is /pə(ɹ)ˈsjuːt/. 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 (verb vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 13504, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
pursuing is recorded at frequency rank #7,598, classified as averb, pronounced /pəˈsjuː.ɪŋ/. pursuit is at rank #5,906, tagged as anoun, pronounced /pə(ɹ)ˈsjuːt/.
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 13504, this pair ranks #475,394 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of pursuing vs pursuit
Shared letters: iprsu. Private to "pursuing": gn. Private to "pursuit": t.
"pursuing" · 8 letters · shape CVCCVVCC · "pursuit" · 7 letters · shape CVCCVVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "pursuing" and "pursuit" mean the same thing in a sentence?
In ordinary English text, does "pursuing" or "pursuit" show up more?
After this comparison
Eye-level mix-up between "pursuing" and "pursuit" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.
- Full dictionary entry for "pursuing" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "pursuit" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #475,394 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "pursuing" and "pursuit" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "purring vs pursuing". 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 #475,394 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.