vibevsvibesWhat's the difference?

Which to use

“vibe” and “vibes” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#7,871
“vibe” frequency rank
#14,045
“vibes” frequency rank
21916
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature vibe vibes
Definition An atmosphere or aura felt to belong to a person, place or thing. plural of vibe

Where the eye mixes vibe and vibes

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence.

4 ch
vibe
5 ch
vibes

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

A purely visual mix-up. vibe (/vaɪb/) and vibes (/vaɪbz/) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 1 extra letter(s) - “vibe” sits inside “vibes”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 21916, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

vibe is recorded at frequency rank #7,871, classified as anoun, pronounced /vaɪb/. vibes is at rank #14,045, tagged as anoun, pronounced /vaɪbz/.

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 21916, this pair ranks #420,420 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of vibe vs vibes

Shared letters: beiv. Private to "vibe": -. Private to "vibes": s.

"vibe" · 4 letters · shape CVCV  ·  "vibes" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • vibeivbe · vbie · vibbe · vieb · vvibe
  • vibesivbes · vbies · vibbes · vibess · vibse · viebs · vvibes

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "vibe" and "vibes" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently (/vaɪb/ versus /vaɪbz/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "vibe" or "vibes"?
"vibe" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #7,871 in our English list, against #14,045 for "vibes". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list