wokenvswoveWhat's the difference?

Which to use

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

#17,995
“woken” frequency rank
#49,728
“wove” frequency rank
67723
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature woken wove
Definition past participle of wake simple past of weave

Where the spellings diverge

Shared letters are muted; the letters that actually set woken and wove apart are highlighted. They share 3 letters in sequence, which is exactly why the eye skips the difference.

5 ch
woken
4 ch
wove

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

A purely visual mix-up. woken (/ˈwəʊ.kən/) and wove (/wəʊv/) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 67723, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

woken is recorded at frequency rank #17,995, classified as averb, pronounced /ˈwəʊ.kən/. wove is at rank #49,728, tagged as averb, pronounced /wəʊv/.

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 67723, this pair ranks #62,051 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of woken vs wove

Shared letters: eow. Private to "woken": kn. Private to "wove": v.

"woken" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC  ·  "wove" · 4 letters · shape CVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • wokenowken · wkoen · woekn · wokenn · wokken · wokne · wwoken
  • woveowve · woev · wovve · wvoe · wwove

Frequency comparison

woken#17,995
wove#49,728

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "woken" and "wove" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently (/ˈwəʊ.kən/ versus /wəʊv/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "woken" or "wove"?
"woken" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #17,995 in our English list, against #49,728 for "wove". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Remembering woken vs wove

The fastest way to pick the right one every time.

  • Read both glosses above and match the meaning you intend, only context separates this pair.
  • See each word in full, definition, IPA, etymology and its other confusables. Full “woken” entry
  • Browse more pairs most likely to be confused. Most confusable

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list FrequencyWords open word-frequency list