wildsvswoldWhat's the difference?

Which to use

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

#33,088
“wilds” frequency rank
#42,997
“wold” frequency rank
76085
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature wilds wold
Definition plural of wild An unforested or deforested plain, a grassland, a moor.

Letter map: wilds vs wold

Shared letters muted; letters that set wilds and wold apart highlighted. Shared run: 3. wilds runs 5 letters (CVCCC) against wold's 4 (CVCC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

5 ch
wilds
4 ch
wold

Pair insight - wilds / wold

wilds and wold are indexed as a confusable English pair. We have no recorded pronunciation or part of speech for both members, so the spelling overlap is what we can show you: they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 76085, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

wilds is recorded at frequency rank #33,088, classified as anoun. wold is at rank #42,997, tagged as anoun, pronounced /wəʊld/.

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 76085, this pair ranks #31,114 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of wilds vs wold

Shared letters: dlw. Private to "wilds": is. Private to "wold": o.

"wilds" · 5 letters · shape CVCCC  ·  "wold" · 4 letters · shape CVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • wilds ← iwlds · widls · wildds · wildss · willds · wilsd · wlids · wwilds
  • wold ← owld · wlod · wodl · woldd · wolld · wwold

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "wilds" for "wold" ever safe?
No. They differ by 1 letter(s) in length, but the dictionary glosses above give them different meanings, so swapping one for the other changes what the sentence says.
Frequency check: "wilds" vs "wold" - which ranks higher?
"wilds" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #33,088 in our English list, against #42,997 for "wold". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "wilds" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "wold" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #31,114 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "wilds" and "wold" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "wold vs wove". 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 #31,114 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