Which to use
“sifted” is an adjective and “sighed” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #49,049
- “sifted” frequency rank
- #24,590
- “sighed” frequency rank
- 73639
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | sifted | sighed |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Having undergone sifting. | simple past and past participle of sigh |
Letter map: sifted vs sighed
Shared letters muted; letters that set sifted and sighed apart highlighted. Shared run: 4. sifted and sighed follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCCVC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.
Part-of-speech tell for sifted / sighed
Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: sifted is anadjective and sighedaverb. On the page they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 73639, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
sifted is recorded at frequency rank #49,049, classified as anadj. sighed is at rank #24,590, tagged as averb, pronounced /saɪd/.
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 73639, this pair ranks #38,952 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of sifted vs sighed
Shared letters: deis. Private to "sifted": ft. Private to "sighed": gh.
"sifted" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC · "sighed" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "sifted" and "sighed" mean the same thing in a sentence?
Which is more common, "sifted" or "sighed"?
Useful next steps
Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "sifted" and "sighed".
- Full dictionary entry for "sifted" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "sighed" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #38,952 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "sifted" and "sighed" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "sifted vs stilted". 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 #38,952 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.