scorevsscouredWhat's the difference?

Which to use

“score” and “scoured” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#1,576
“score” frequency rank
#35,066
“scoured” frequency rank
36642
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature score scoured
Definition The total number of goals, points, runs, etc. earned by a participant in a game. Wool that has undergone scouring to remove grease.

Letter map: score vs scoured

Shared letters muted; letters that set score and scoured apart highlighted. Shared run: 5.

5 ch
score
7 ch
scoured

Spelling & dictionary notes on score vs scoured

score and scoured are indexed as a confusable English pair. We have no recorded pronunciation or part of speech for both members, so the spelling overlap is what we can show you: they differ by 2 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 36642, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

score is recorded at frequency rank #1,576, classified as anoun, pronounced /skɔː/. scoured is at rank #35,066, tagged as anoun.

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 36642, this pair ranks #301,436 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of score vs scoured

Shared letters: ceors. Private to "score": -. Private to "scoured": du.

"score" · 5 letters · shape CCVCV  ·  "scoured" · 7 letters · shape CCVVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • scorecsore · sccore · scoer · scorre · scroe · socre · sscore
  • scouredcsoured · sccoured · scorued · scouerd · scourde · scouredd · scourred · scuored

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "score" for "scoured" ever safe?
No. They differ by 2 letter(s) in length, but the dictionary glosses above give them different meanings, so swapping one for the other changes what the sentence says.
Frequency check: "score" vs "scoured" - which ranks higher?
"score" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #1,576 in our English list, against #35,066 for "scoured". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Useful next steps

Pair "score" vs "scoured" is on the table, pick a follow-up below.

  • Full dictionary entry for "score" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "scoured" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #301,436 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "score" and "scoured" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "scorned vs scoured". 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 #301,436 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list