Which to use
“grass” is a noun and “gross” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #38,828
- “grass” frequency rank
- #22,579
- “gross” frequency rank
- 61407
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | grass | gross |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Herbe. | Variante orthographique de groß. |
Where the eye mixes grass and gross
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. grass and gross follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CCVCC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.
Look-alike desk: grass vs gross
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: grass is \ɡɹɑːs\ while gross is \ɡʀoːs\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by a single letter - a in “grass” becomes o in “gross”, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 61407, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
grass is recorded at frequency rank #38,828, classified as anoun, pronounced \ɡɹɑːs\. gross is at rank #22,579, tagged as anadj, pronounced \ɡʀoːs\.
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 61407, this pair ranks #92,473 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of grass vs gross
Shared letters: grs. Private to "grass": a. Private to "gross": o.
"grass" · 5 letters · shape CCVCC · "gross" · 5 letters · shape CCVCC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "grass" and "gross" mean the same thing in a sentence?
Which is more common, "grass" or "gross"?
What to do next
Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.
- Full dictionary entry for "grass" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "gross" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #92,473 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "grass" and "gross" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "graf vs grass". 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 #92,473 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.