Which to use
“telling” is a verb and “tilting” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #1,288
- “telling” frequency rank
- #24,931
- “tilting” frequency rank
- 26219
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | telling | tilting |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | present participle and gerund of tell | The motion of something that tilts; a tilt. |
Letter map: telling vs tilting
Shared letters muted; letters that set telling and tilting apart highlighted. Shared run: 5.
Part-of-speech tell for telling / tilting
Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: telling is averb and tiltinganoun. On the page they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 26219, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
telling is recorded at frequency rank #1,288, classified as averb, pronounced /ˈtɛlɪŋ/. tilting is at rank #24,931, tagged as anoun.
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 26219, this pair ranks #388,341 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of telling vs tilting
Shared letters: gilnt. Private to "telling": e. Private to "tilting": -.
"telling" · 7 letters · shape CVCCVCC · "tilting" · 7 letters · shape CVCCVCC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Can "telling" and "tilting" be used interchangeably?
Which is more common, "telling" or "tilting"?
Useful next steps
Pair "telling" vs "tilting" is on the table, pick a follow-up below.
- Full dictionary entry for "telling" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "tilting" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #388,341 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "telling" and "tilting" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "tilting vs toiling". 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 #388,341 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.