Which to use
“wear” is a verb and “well” is an adverb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #1,289
- “wear” frequency rank
- #99
- “well” frequency rank
- 1388
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | wear | well |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | To have on: | Accurately, competently, satisfactorily. |
Where the eye mixes wear and well
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: wear is /wɛə/ while well is /ˈwɛl/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (verb vs adverb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 1388, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
wear is recorded at frequency rank #1,289, classified as averb, pronounced /wɛə/. well is at rank #99, tagged as anadv, pronounced /ˈwɛl/.
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 1388, this pair ranks #527,540 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of wear vs well
Shared letters: ew. Private to "wear": ar. Private to "well": l.
"wear" · 4 letters · shape CVVC · "well" · 4 letters · shape CVCC