Commonly misspelled English words
Commonly misspelled English words are words that are often unintentionally misspelled in general writing.
A selected list of common words is presented below, under Documented list of common misspellings.
Although the word common is subjective depending on the situation, the focus is on general writing, rather than in a specific field. Accepted spellings also vary by country or region, with some rejecting the American or British variants as incorrect for the region.
Within a particular field of study, such as computer graphics, other words might be more common for misspelling, such as "pixel" misspelled as "pixle". Sometimes words are purposely misspelled, as a form in slang, abbreviations, or in song lyrics, etc.
In general writing, some words are frequently misspelled, such as the incorrect spelling "" for "consensus"
found in numerous webpages. Other common misspellings include "",
"",
"readible",
or "usible".
Unlimited misspellings
Because many words can be extended with prefixes or suffixes, a comprehensive list of words prone to misspelling would contain thousands of variations from combining prefixes or suffixes added to the root words. To limit the scope to common words, the top 350 words are considered.Documented list of common misspellings
The following list, of about 350 words, is based on documented lists of the top 100, 200, or 400 most commonly misspelled words in all variants of the English language, rather than listing every conceivable misspelled word. Some words are followed by examples of misspellings:A–B
- absence –
- acceptable –
- accidentally/accidently –
- accommodate –
- achieve –
- acknowledge –
- acquaintance –
- acquire –
- acquit –
- acreage –
- address –
- adultery –
- advisable –
- affect –
- aggression –
- aggressive –
- allegiance –
- almost –
- a lot – ,
- amateur –
- annually –
- apparent –
- arctic –
- argument –
- atheist –
- awful –
- because –
- beautiful –
- becoming –
- beginning –
- believe –
- bellwether –
- benefit –
- buoy –
- buoyant –
- business –
C–D
- calendar –
- camouflage –
- capitol – capital
- Caribbean –
- category –
- caught –
- cemetery –, cematery
- changeable –
- chief –
- colleague –
- column –
- coming –
- committed –
- comparison –
- concede –
- congratulate –
- conscientious –
- conscious –
- consensus –
- controversy –
- coolly –
- daiquiri –
- deceive –
- definite –,
- definitely –,,,
- desperate –
- difference –
- dilemma –
- disappoint –
- disastrous –
- drunkenness –
- dumbbell –
E–H
- embarrass –
- equipment –
- exceed –
- exhilarate –
- existence –
- experience –
- extreme –
- fascinating –
- fiery –
- fluorescent –
- foreign –
- forty –
- friend –
- fulfil –
- gauge –
- grateful –
- great –
- guarantee –
- guidance –
- harass –
- height –
- hierarchy –
- hors d'oeuvres –
- humorous –
- hygiene –
- hypocrisy/hypocrite –
I–K
- ignorance –
- imitate –
- immediately –
- indict –
- independent –
- indispensable –
- inoculate –
- intelligence –
- jewelry /jewellery –
- judgment –
- kernel –
L–O
- leisure –
- liaison –
- library –
- license –
- lightning –
- lose – loose
- maintenance –
- marshmallow –
- medieval –
- memento –
- millennium –
- miniature –
- minuscule –
- mischievous –
- misspell –
- necessary –
- niece –
- neighbour –
- noticeable –
- occasion –
- occasionally –
- occurrence –
- occurred –
- omission –
- original –
- outrageous –
P–Q
- parliament –
- pastime –
- pedagogue –
- perceive –
- perseverance –
- personnel –
- plagiarize –
- playwright –
- possession –
- potatoes –
- precede –
- presence –
- principle –
- privilege –
- professor –
- promise –
- pronunciation –
- proof –
- prophecy – prophesy
- publicly –
- quarantine –
- queue –
- questionnaire –
R–S
- readable –
- really –
- receive –
- receipt –
- recommend –
- referred –
- reference –
- relevant –
- religious –
- repetition –
- restaurant –
- rhyme – rime
- rhythm –
- secretary –
- seize –
- separate –
- sergeant –
- similar –
- skilful –
- speech –, speeche
- successful –
- supersede –
- surprise –
T–Z
- than – then
- their – there, they're
- tomatoes –
- tomorrow –
- twelfth –
- tyranny –
- underrate –
- until –
- upholstery –
- usable/useable –
- vacuum –
- vehicle –
- vicious –
- what –
- weather –
- weird –
- welfare –
- whether –
- wilful –
- withhold –
- writing –
- you're –
- your –
Common causes of misspellings
Mispronunciation
is known to be one of the most common causes of misspelling.Hence, phonetic misspelling is common, once a word is mispronounced. For example, the word realise may be misspelled as "".
Typing errors
Some spelling errors are introduced because the typing of certain people is not perfect, such as- letters are doubled, or more frequently double letters tripled, such as "" and ""
- letters are singled, such as ""
- keys are transposed, so "because" becomes "".
Homophones
Two differently spelled words with different meanings are homophones if they are nonetheless pronounced the same; e.g., "right", "rite", "wright", and "write"; "read" and "reed"; "read" and "red". This list includes only a few homophones although incorrect use of homophones is a very common error; the following words from the list are all correct English words, though often incorrectly used in place of their homophones:- advice – advise
- affect – effect
- artic – arctic
- aweful – awful
- breath – breathe
- calender – calendar
- capital – capitol
- dose – doze
- hart – heart
- its – it's
- lightening – lightning
- loose – lose
- loosing – losing
- planing – planning
- principal – principle
- reign – rain
- rime – rhyme
- sight – site
- stomping – stamping
- they're – their
- wether – weather
- you're – your