Ton or tun?
ton is a noun meaning “The short ton of 2000 pounds (about 907 kg), 20 hundredweights of 100 pounds…”; tun is a noun meaning “A large cask; an oblong vessel bulging in the middle, like a pipe or puncheon…”. They sound the same (/tʌn/). In written English (wordfreq, 2021 data) ton is about 21 times as common as tun.
What is the difference between ton and tun?
| ton | tun | |
|---|---|---|
| Part of speech | noun, suffix | noun, verb |
| Meaning | The short ton of 2000 pounds (about 907 kg), 20 hundredweights of 100 pounds avoirdupois each The long ton of 2240 pounds (about 1016 kg), 20 hundredweights of 112 pounds avoirdupois each Fashion, the current style, the vogue | A large cask; an oblong vessel bulging in the middle, like a pipe or puncheon, and girt with hoops; a wine cask. (See a diagram comparing cask sizes.) A fermenting vat To put into tuns, or casks |
| Example | I’ve got a ton of work to do | none recorded |
| Forms | tons | tuns tuns, tunob |
| Pronunciation | /tʌn/ /tʊn/ /tɔ̃/ | /tʌn/ /tʊn/ |
| In writing | 19 times per million words | about once in every 1 million words |
Sources: ton and tun in the English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0); written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
Every current meaning of ton and tun
ton
- 1
The short ton of 2000 pounds (about 907 kg), 20 hundredweights of 100 pounds avoirdupois each
- 2
Fashion, the current style, the vogue
- 3
Synonym of tunny, particularly the common tunny or horse mackerel
- 4
Place-name suffix, originally denoting a town or enclosure of buildings
Washington
- 5
Initialism of threshold odor number
- 6
The long ton of 2240 pounds (about 1016 kg), 20 hundredweights of 112 pounds avoirdupois each
- 7
Fashionable society; those in style
- 8
A set of specific objects or persons
singleton
tun
- 1
A large cask; an oblong vessel bulging in the middle, like a pipe or puncheon, and girt with hoops; a wine cask. (See a diagram comparing cask sizes.)
- 2
To put into tuns, or casks
- 3
A part of the ancient Maya Long Count Calendar system which corresponds to 18 winal cycles or 360 days
- 4
A respectful term of address to royalties and certain award recipients
- 5
A fermenting vat
- 6
A traditional unit of liquid measure (from the volume of such a cask) equal to 252 wine gallons or 2 pipes
- 7
Synonym of long ton: a unit of mass equal to 2240 pounds, 20 hundredweights of 112 pounds avoirdupois each
- 8
Synonym of ton: any extremely or excessively large amount
Source: the English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0); obsolete, archaic, dialect and rare senses left out.
Which is more common, ton or tun?
ton appears 19 times per million words; tun about once in every 1 million words.
ton 19 times per million wordstun about once in every 1 million words
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).