tomvsTroyWhich spelling fits?

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

Which to use

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

#2,600
“tom” frequency rank
#18,897
“Troy” frequency rank
21497
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature tom Troy
Definition Abréviation courante de tom-tom (instrument de percussion). Prénom masculin.

Letter map: tom vs Troy

Shared letters muted; letters that set tom and Troy apart highlighted. Shared run: 2.

3 ch
tom
4 ch
Troy

Part-of-speech tell for tom / Troy

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: tom is anoun and Troyaname. On the page they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 21497, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

tom is recorded at frequency rank #2,600, classified as anoun, pronounced \tɔm\. Troy is at rank #18,897, tagged as aname.

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 21497, this pair ranks #362,880 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of tom vs Troy

Shared letters: ot. Private to "tom": m. Private to "Troy": ry.

"tom" · 3 letters · shape CVC  ·  "Troy" · 4 letters · shape CCVV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • Troyrtoy · troyy · trroy · tryo · ttroy

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "tom" for "Troy" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "tom" is a noun and "Troy" a name, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "tom" vs "Troy" - which ranks higher?
"tom" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #2,600 in our French list, against #18,897 for "Troy". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "tom" and "Troy".

  • Full dictionary entry for "tom" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "Troy" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #362,880 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "tom" and "Troy" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "tos vs Troy". 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 #362,880 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