Which to use
“told” is a verb and “TOS” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #268
- “told” frequency rank
- #19,720
- “TOS” frequency rank
- 19988
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | told | TOS |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | simple past and past participle of tell | Initialism of terms of service. |
Where the eye mixes told and TOS
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.
Visual trap between told and TOS
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: told is /təʊld/ while TOS is /tiː əʊ ɛs/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (verb vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 19988, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
told is recorded at frequency rank #268, classified as averb, pronounced /təʊld/. TOS is at rank #19,720, tagged as anoun, pronounced /tiː əʊ ɛs/.
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 19988, this pair ranks #434,312 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of told vs TOS
Shared letters: ot. Private to "told": dl. Private to "TOS": s.
"told" · 4 letters · shape CVCC · "TOS" · 3 letters · shape CVC
Known mistypes of this pair
- told ← otld · tlod · todl · toldd · tolld · ttold
Frequently Asked Questions
Can "told" and "TOS" be used interchangeably?
Frequency check: "told" vs "TOS" - which ranks higher?
After this comparison
Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.
- Full dictionary entry for "told" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "TOS" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #434,312 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "told" and "TOS" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Taf vs TOS". 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 #434,312 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.