woldvswoundWhat's the difference?

Which to use

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

#42,997
“wold” frequency rank
#4,814
“wound” frequency rank
47811
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature wold wound
Definition An unforested or deforested plain, a grassland, a moor. An injury, such as a cut, stab, or tear, to a (usually external) part of the body.

Where the eye mixes wold and wound

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.

4 ch
wold
5 ch
wound

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

A purely visual mix-up. wold (/wəʊld/) and wound (/wuːnd/) 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 47811, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

wold is recorded at frequency rank #42,997, classified as anoun, pronounced /wəʊld/. wound is at rank #4,814, tagged as anoun, pronounced /wuːnd/.

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 47811, this pair ranks #198,990 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of wold vs wound

Shared letters: dow. Private to "wold": l. Private to "wound": nu.

"wold" · 4 letters · shape CVCC  ·  "wound" · 5 letters · shape CVVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • woldowld · wlod · wodl · woldd · wolld · wwold
  • woundowund · wonud · woudn · woundd · wounnd · wuond · wwound

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "wold" and "wound" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently (/wəʊld/ versus /wuːnd/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "wold" or "wound"?
"wound" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #4,814 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.

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list