Which to use
“skilful” and “skillful” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #32,595
- “skilful” frequency rank
- #24,592
- “skillful” frequency rank
- 57187
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | skilful | skillful |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Commonwealth and Irish form standard spelling of skillful | Possessing skill; skilled. |
Same sound, different letters: skilful vs skillful
Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 7 letters.
Same sound, different spelling - skilful / skillful
This is the hard kind. skilful and skillful are pronounced identically (/ˈskɪlfəl/) and both work as anadjective. Neither the ear nor the grammar will rescue you; only the meaning does, so the glosses below are the whole decision. They differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 57187, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
skilful is recorded at frequency rank #32,595, classified as anadj, pronounced /ˈskɪlfəl/. skillful is at rank #24,592, tagged as anadj, pronounced /ˈskɪl.fəl/.
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 57187, this pair ranks #121,007 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of skilful vs skillful
Shared letters: fiklsu. Private to "skilful": -. Private to "skillful": -.
"skilful" · 7 letters · shape CCVCCVC · "skillful" · 8 letters · shape CCVCCCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Can "skilful" and "skillful" be used interchangeably?
In ordinary English text, does "skilful" or "skillful" show up more?
What to do next
You've separated the homophone pair "skilful" / "skillful". Follow the links when you need the full entry or a neighbour that trips the same ear.
- Full dictionary entry for "skilful" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "skillful" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #121,007 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "skilful" and "skillful" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "skillful vs skillfully". 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 #121,007 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.