Which to use
“told” is a verb and “tons” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #45,349
- “told” frequency rank
- #12,272
- “tons” frequency rank
- 57621
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | told | tons |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Prétérit de tell. | Pluriel de ton. |
Where the eye mixes told and tons
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.
Why the eye confuses told with tons
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: told is \təʊld\ while tons is \tɔ̃\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (verb vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 57621, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
told is recorded at frequency rank #45,349, classified as averb, pronounced \təʊld\. tons is at rank #12,272, tagged as anoun, pronounced \tɔ̃\.
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 57621, this pair ranks #113,934 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of told vs tons
Shared letters: ot. Private to "told": dl. Private to "tons": ns.
"told" · 4 letters · shape CVCC · "tons" · 4 letters · shape CVCC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "told" for "tons" ever safe?
Frequency check: "told" vs "tons" - which ranks higher?
After this comparison
Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.
- Full dictionary entry for "told" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "tons" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #113,934 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "told" and "tons" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "tad vs told". 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 #113,934 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.