yore vs york, What's the Difference?

Which to use

“yore” is a noun and “york” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#45,179
“yore” frequency rank: #429
“york” frequency rank: 45608
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature	yore	york
Definition	A time long past.	to bowl a yorker at a batsman, especially to get a batsman out in this way.

Where the spellings diverge

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

4 ch

yore

4 ch

york

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: yore is /jɔː/ while york is /jɔː(ɹ)k/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by a single letter - e in “yore” becomes k in “york”, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 45608, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

yore is recorded at frequency rank #45,179, classified as anoun, pronounced /jɔː/. york is at rank #429, tagged as averb, pronounced /jɔː(ɹ)k/.

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 45608, this pair ranks #219,638 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of yore vs york

Shared letters: ory. Private to "yore": e. Private to "york": k.

"yore" · 4 letters · shape VVCV · "york" · 4 letters · shape VVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

yore ← oyre · yoer · yorre · yroe · yyore
york ← oyrk · yokr · yorkk · yorrk · yrok · yyork

Frequency comparison

yore#45,179

york#429

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "yore" and "york" be used interchangeably?

No - they are not even the same part of speech. "yore" is a noun and "york" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.

Which is more common, "yore" or "york"?

"york" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #429 in our English list, against #45,179 for "yore". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Remembering yore vs york

The fastest way to pick the right one every time.

Check the role first: if you need a noun, it's “yore”; for a verb, it's “york”.
See each word in full, definition, IPA, etymology and its other confusables. Full “yore” entry
Browse more pairs most likely to be confused. Most confusable