Which to use
“walked” is a verb and “willed” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #2,187
- “walked” frequency rank
- #24,058
- “willed” frequency rank
- 26245
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | walked | willed |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | simple past and past participle of walk | Having a document specifying inheritance. |
Letter map: walked vs willed
Shared letters muted; letters that set walked and willed apart highlighted. Shared run: 4. walked and willed follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCCVC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.
Grammar separator: walked vs willed
Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: walked is averb and willedanadjective. On the page they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 26245, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
walked is recorded at frequency rank #2,187, classified as averb, pronounced /wɔːkt/. willed is at rank #24,058, tagged as anadj.
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 26245, this pair ranks #388,142 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of walked vs willed
Shared letters: delw. Private to "walked": ak. Private to "willed": i.
"walked" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC · "willed" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Can "walked" and "willed" be used interchangeably?
In ordinary English text, does "walked" or "willed" show up more?
What to do next
You've compared "walked" and "willed". Here's where to go from here.
- Full dictionary entry for "walked" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "willed" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #388,142 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "walked" and "willed" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "willed vs Willey". 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 #388,142 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.