# shades vs shadow

> English confusable word pair

## The two words

### shades
*noun · IPA /ʃeɪdz/ · frequency rank #7,177*
plural of shade

### shadow
*noun · IPA /ˈʃædəʊ/ · frequency rank #3,395*
A dark image projected onto a surface where light (or other radiation) is blocked by the shade of an object.

## Source
Compiled from Wiktionary via kaikki.org (CC BY-SA). Data vintage: 2026-05-06.
Canonical page: https://plainspell.com/en/vs/shades-vs-shadow