SundayvssundryWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: Sunday is a noun, sundry is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“Sunday” is a noun and “sundry” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#1,287
“Sunday” frequency rank
#39,123
“sundry” frequency rank
40410
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature Sunday sundry
Definition The first day of the week in many religious traditions, and the seventh day of the week in systems using the ISO 8601 standard; the Christian Sabbath; the Lord's Day; it follows Saturday and precedes Monday. More than one or two but not very many; a number of, several.

Where the eye mixes Sunday and sundry

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence.

6 ch
Sunday
6 ch
sundry

Look-alike desk: Sunday vs sundry

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: Sunday is /ˈsʌn.deɪ/ while sundry is /ˈsʌnd.ɹi/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by a single letter - a in “Sunday” becomes r in “sundry”, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 40410, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

Sunday is recorded at frequency rank #1,287, classified as anoun, pronounced /ˈsʌn.deɪ/. sundry is at rank #39,123, tagged as anadj, pronounced /ˈsʌnd.ɹi/.

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 40410, this pair ranks #267,854 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of Sunday vs sundry

Shared letters: dnsuy. Private to "Sunday": a. Private to "sundry": r.

"Sunday" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVV  ·  "sundry" · 6 letters · shape CVCCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • Sundaysnuday · ssunday · sudnay · sunady · sundayy · sundday · sundya · sunnday
  • sundrysnudry · ssundry · sudnry · sunddry · sundrry · sundryy · sundyr · sunndry

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "Sunday" for "sundry" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "Sunday" is a noun and "sundry" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "Sunday" or "sundry"?
"Sunday" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #1,287 in our English list, against #39,123 for "sundry". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

What to do next

Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.

  • Full dictionary entry for "Sunday" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "sundry" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #267,854 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "Sunday" and "sundry" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "sundry vs surry". 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 #267,854 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list