weighsvswightWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: weighs is a verb, wight is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“weighs” is a verb and “wight” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#11,495
“weighs” frequency rank
#21,706
“wight” frequency rank
33201
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature weighs wight
Definition third-person singular simple present indicative of weigh A living creature, especially a human being.

Where the eye mixes weighs and wight

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. weighs runs 6 letters (CVVCCC) against wight's 5 (CVCCC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

6 ch
weighs
5 ch
wight

Visual trap between weighs and wight

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: weighs is /weɪz/ while wight is /waɪt/. 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 33201, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

weighs is recorded at frequency rank #11,495, classified as averb, pronounced /weɪz/. wight is at rank #21,706, tagged as anoun, pronounced /waɪt/.

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 33201, this pair ranks #331,452 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of weighs vs wight

Shared letters: ghiw. Private to "weighs": es. Private to "wight": t.

"weighs" · 6 letters · shape CVVCCC  ·  "wight" · 5 letters · shape CVCCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • weighs ← ewighs · wegihs · weigghs · weighhs · weighss · weigsh · weihgs · wieghs
  • wight ← iwght · wgiht · wigght · wighht · wightt · wigth · wihgt · wwight

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "weighs" for "wight" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "weighs" is a verb and "wight" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "weighs" vs "wight" - which ranks higher?
"weighs" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #11,495 in our English list, against #21,706 for "wight". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Eye-level mix-up between "weighs" and "wight" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "weighs" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "wight" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #331,452 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "weighs" and "wight" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "wich vs wight". 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 #331,452 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list