worvswordsWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: wor is a determiner, words is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“wor” is a determiner and “words” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#36,016
“wor” frequency rank
#566
“words” frequency rank
36582
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature wor words
Definition Our. plural of word

Where the eye mixes wor and words

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

3 ch
wor
5 ch
words

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: wor is /wɔː/ while words is /wɜːdz/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 2 extra letter(s) - “wor” sits inside “words”, and the parts of speech differ too (determiner vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 36582, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

wor is recorded at frequency rank #36,016, classified as adet, pronounced /wɔː/. words is at rank #566, tagged as anoun, pronounced /wɜːdz/.

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 36582, this pair ranks #301,934 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of wor vs words

Shared letters: orw. Private to "wor": -. Private to "words": ds.

"wor" · 3 letters · shape CVC  ·  "words" · 5 letters · shape CVCCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • wordsowrds · wodrs · wordds · wordss · worrds · worsd · wrods · wwords

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "wor" and "words" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "wor" is a determiner and "words" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "wor" or "words"?
"words" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #566 in our English list, against #36,016 for "wor". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list