Which to use
“woof” is a noun and “worn” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #24,959
- “woof” frequency rank
- #4,644
- “worn” frequency rank
- 29603
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | woof | worn |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | The set of yarns carried by the shuttle of a loom which are placed crosswise at right angles to and interlaced with the warp; the weft. | Damaged and shabby as a result of much use. |
Where the eye mixes woof and worn
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.
Look-alike desk: woof vs worn
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: woof is /wuːf/ while worn is /wɔːn/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 29603, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
woof is recorded at frequency rank #24,959, classified as anoun, pronounced /wuːf/. worn is at rank #4,644, tagged as anadj, pronounced /wɔːn/.
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 29603, this pair ranks #361,594 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of woof vs worn
Shared letters: ow. Private to "woof": f. Private to "worn": nr.
"woof" · 4 letters · shape CVVC · "worn" · 4 letters · shape CVCC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "woof" and "worn" mean the same thing in a sentence?
Frequency check: "woof" vs "worn" - which ranks higher?
What to do next
Eye-level mix-up between "woof" and "worn" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.
- Full dictionary entry for "woof" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "worn" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #361,594 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "woof" and "worn" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "woof 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 #361,594 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.