Which to use
“willing” is an adjective and “willingly” is an adverb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #1,976
- “willing” frequency rank
- #13,446
- “willingly” frequency rank
- 15422
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | willing | willingly |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Ready to do something, particularly something that requires change or effort; not objecting. | Of one’s own free will; freely and spontaneously. |
Where the eye mixes willing and willingly
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 7 letters in sequence.
Look-alike desk: willing vs willingly
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: willing is /ˈwɪlɪŋ/ while willingly is /ˈwɪlɪŋli/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 2 extra letter(s) - “willing” sits inside “willingly”, and the parts of speech differ too (adjective vs adverb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 15422, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
willing is recorded at frequency rank #1,976, classified as anadj, pronounced /ˈwɪlɪŋ/. willingly is at rank #13,446, tagged as anadv, pronounced /ˈwɪlɪŋli/.
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 15422, this pair ranks #464,066 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of willing vs willingly
Shared letters: gilnw. Private to "willing": -. Private to "willingly": y.
"willing" · 7 letters · shape CVCCVCC · "willingly" · 9 letters · shape CVCCVCCCV
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "willing" for "willingly" ever safe?
Frequency check: "willing" vs "willingly" - which ranks higher?
After this comparison
Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.
- Full dictionary entry for "willing" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "willingly" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #464,066 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "willing" and "willingly" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "willing vs winging". 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 #464,066 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.