Which to use
“sound” is an adjective and “sounded” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #742
- “sound” frequency rank
- #5,918
- “sounded” frequency rank
- 6660
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | sound | sounded |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Healthy. | simple past and past participle of sound |
Where the eye mixes sound and sounded
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence.
Visual trap between sound and sounded
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: sound is /saʊnd/ while sounded is /ˈsaʊndɪd/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 2 extra letter(s) - “sound” sits inside “sounded”, and the parts of speech differ too (adjective vs verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 6660, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
sound is recorded at frequency rank #742, classified as anadj, pronounced /saʊnd/. sounded is at rank #5,918, tagged as averb, pronounced /ˈsaʊndɪd/.
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 6660, this pair ranks #510,531 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of sound vs sounded
Shared letters: dnosu. Private to "sound": -. Private to "sounded": e.
"sound" · 5 letters · shape CVVCC · "sounded" · 7 letters · shape CVVCCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "sound" for "sounded" ever safe?
In ordinary English text, does "sound" or "sounded" show up more?
Useful next steps
Eye-level mix-up between "sound" and "sounded" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.
- Full dictionary entry for "sound" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "sounded" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #510,531 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "sound" and "sounded" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "sone vs sound". 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 #510,531 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.