Which to use
“sear” and “seared” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #41,374
- “sear” frequency rank
- #33,840
- “seared” frequency rank
- 75214
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | sear | seared |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Dry; withered, especially of vegetation. | blackened by heat; scorched; burned |
Letter map: sear vs seared
Shared letters muted; letters that set sear and seared apart highlighted. Shared run: 4. sear runs 4 letters (CVVC) against seared's 6 (CVVCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Spelling & dictionary notes on sear vs seared
sear and seared 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 extra letter(s) - “sear” sits inside “seared”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 75214, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
sear is recorded at frequency rank #41,374, classified as anadj, pronounced /sɪɚ/. seared is at rank #33,840, tagged as anadj.
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 75214, this pair ranks #33,834 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of sear vs seared
Shared letters: aers. Private to "sear": -. Private to "seared": d.
"sear" · 4 letters · shape CVVC · "seared" · 6 letters · shape CVVCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "sear" for "seared" ever safe?
In ordinary English text, does "sear" or "seared" show up more?
After this comparison
You've compared "sear" and "seared". Here's where to go from here.
- Full dictionary entry for "sear" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "seared" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #33,834 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "sear" and "seared" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Seager vs sear". 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 #33,834 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.