MosesvsmusesWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: Moses is a name, muses is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“Moses” is a name and “muses” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#32,490
“Moses” frequency rank
#31,145
“muses” frequency rank
63635
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature Moses muses
Definition Moïse (prophète). Pluriel de muse.

Where the eye mixes Moses and muses

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence.

5 ch
Moses
5 ch
muses

Visual trap between Moses and muses

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: Moses is \məʊ.zɪz\ while muses is \myz\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by a single letter - o in “Moses” becomes u in “muses”, and the parts of speech differ too (name vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 63635, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

Moses is recorded at frequency rank #32,490, classified as aname, pronounced \məʊ.zɪz\. muses is at rank #31,145, tagged as anoun, pronounced \myz\.

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 63635, this pair ranks #80,983 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of Moses vs muses

Shared letters: ems. Private to "Moses": o. Private to "muses": u.

"Moses" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC  ·  "muses" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • Mosesmmoses · moess · mosess · mosse · mosses · msoes · omses
  • musesmmuses · msues · muess · musess · musses · umses

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "Moses" for "muses" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "Moses" is a name and "muses" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "Moses" or "muses"?
"muses" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #31,145 in our French list, against #32,490 for "Moses". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "Moses" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "muses" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #80,983 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "Moses" and "muses" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "moqués vs Moses". 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 #80,983 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list