Which to use
“shrunken” is an adjective and “sunken” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #45,655
- “shrunken” frequency rank
- #20,793
- “sunken” frequency rank
- 66448
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | shrunken | sunken |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Reduced in size as a result of shrinkage; shrivelled. | past participle of sink |
Letter map: shrunken vs sunken
Shared letters muted; letters that set shrunken and sunken apart highlighted. Shared run: 6. shrunken runs 8 letters (CCCVCCVC) against sunken's 6 (CVCCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Role in the sentence - shrunken and sunken
Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: shrunken is anadjective and sunkenaverb. On the page they differ by 2 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 66448, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
shrunken is recorded at frequency rank #45,655, classified as anadj. sunken is at rank #20,793, tagged as averb, pronounced /ˈsʌŋkən/.
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 66448, this pair ranks #67,915 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of shrunken vs sunken
Shared letters: eknsu. Private to "shrunken": hr. Private to "sunken": -.
"shrunken" · 8 letters · shape CCCVCCVC · "sunken" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "shrunken" for "sunken" ever safe?
Frequency check: "shrunken" vs "sunken" - which ranks higher?
Useful next steps
Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "shrunken" and "sunken".
- Full dictionary entry for "shrunken" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "sunken" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #67,915 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "shrunken" and "sunken" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "shrunk vs shrunken". 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 #67,915 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.