Which to use
“lay” is an adjective and “levy” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #27,500
- “lay” frequency rank
- #19,894
- “levy” frequency rank
- 47394
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | lay | levy |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Variante de lé. | Prélever, imposer. |
Letter map: lay vs levy
Shared letters muted; letters that set lay and levy apart highlighted. Shared run: 2.
Part-of-speech tell for lay / levy
Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: lay is anadjective and levyaverb. On the page they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 47394, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
lay is recorded at frequency rank #27,500, classified as anadj. levy is at rank #19,894, tagged as averb.
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 47394, this pair ranks #187,327 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of lay vs levy
Shared letters: ly. Private to "lay": a. Private to "levy": ev.
"lay" · 3 letters · shape CVV · "levy" · 4 letters · shape CVCV
Known mistypes of this pair
- levy ← elvy · levvy · levyy · leyv · llevy · lvey
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "lay" and "levy" mean the same thing in a sentence?
Frequency check: "lay" vs "levy" - which ranks higher?
Useful next steps
Pair "lay" vs "levy" is on the table, pick a follow-up below.
- Full dictionary entry for "lay" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "levy" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #187,327 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "lay" and "levy" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "lay vs lep". 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 #187,327 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.