wildsvswisTell them apart

Quick tell: wilds is a noun, wis is an adverb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“wilds” is a noun and “wis” is an adverb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#33,088
“wilds” frequency rank
#21,426
“wis” frequency rank
54514
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature wilds wis
Definition plural of wild Certainly, surely.

Letter map: wilds vs wis

Shared letters muted; letters that set wilds and wis apart highlighted. Shared run: 3. wilds runs 5 letters (CVCCC) against wis's 3 (CVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

5 ch
wilds
3 ch
wis

Part-of-speech tell for wilds / wis

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: wilds is anoun and wisanadverb. On the page they differ by 2 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 54514, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

wilds is recorded at frequency rank #33,088, classified as anoun. wis is at rank #21,426, tagged as anadv, pronounced /waɪs/.

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 54514, this pair ranks #140,503 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of wilds vs wis

Shared letters: isw. Private to "wilds": dl. Private to "wis": -.

"wilds" · 5 letters · shape CVCCC  ·  "wis" · 3 letters · shape CVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • wilds ← iwlds · widls · wildds · wildss · willds · wilsd · wlids · wwilds

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "wilds" and "wis" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "wilds" is a noun and "wis" an adverb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "wilds" vs "wis" - which ranks higher?
"wis" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #21,426 in our English list, against #33,088 for "wilds". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "wilds" and "wis".

  • Full dictionary entry for "wilds" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "wis" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #140,503 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "wilds" and "wis" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "wilds vs wile". 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 #140,503 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