Which to use
“really” is an adverb and “realty” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #113
- “really” frequency rank
- #18,171
- “realty” frequency rank
- 18284
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | really | realty |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | In a way or manner that is real, not unreal. | Real estate; a piece of real property; land. |
Where the eye mixes really and realty
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence. really and realty follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVVCCV). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.
Why the eye confuses really with realty
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: really is /ˈɹɪə.li/ while realty is /ˈɹiəlti/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by a single letter - l in “really” becomes t in “realty”, and the parts of speech differ too (adverb vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 18284, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
really is recorded at frequency rank #113, classified as anadv, pronounced /ˈɹɪə.li/. realty is at rank #18,171, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ˈɹiəlti/.
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 18284, this pair ranks #445,916 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of really vs realty
Shared letters: aelry. Private to "really": -. Private to "realty": t.
"really" · 6 letters · shape CVVCCV · "realty" · 6 letters · shape CVVCCV
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "really" for "realty" ever safe?
In ordinary English text, does "really" or "realty" show up more?
What to do next
Eye-level mix-up between "really" and "realty" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.
- Full dictionary entry for "really" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "realty" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #445,916 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "really" and "realty" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "realty vs rialto". 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 #445,916 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.