Commonly confused words

280 pairs English learners mix up — grouped by the kind of mistake, so you can find yours without knowing its name.

• Everyday pairs 25 The ones that come up first: borrow and lend, say and tell, do and make.
• Grammar and structure 37 Its and it's, then and than, fewer and less — the pairs that change a sentence.
• Verb pairs 44 Lie and lay, rise and raise: verbs that differ by what they take as an object.
• Prepositions 20 Arrive in or arrive at, depend on, married to — the small words that go with the verb.
• Adjectives 21 Bored and boring, sensible and sensitive: how you feel against what caused it.
• Nouns 33 Job and work, price and cost, advice and advise — nouns learners swap.
• Time and frequency 10 Since and for, already and yet, by and until: how English marks when.
• Academic and professional 33 Effective and efficient, imply and infer — pairs that matter in formal writing.
• British and American 23 Colour and color, lift and elevator, maths and math: the same language, two habits.
• False friends 34 Actual, eventually, sympathetic — English words your first language will mislead you about.

The same sets cut a second way, for when you know the subject but not the grammar it belongs to.

Each of these has a page of its own.

• affect vs effect
• borrow vs lend
• bring vs take
• come vs go
• do vs make
• fun vs funny
• hear vs listen
• know vs know how
• learn vs teach
• look vs see vs watch
• say vs tell
• speak vs talk
• since vs for
• wait vs expect
• win vs beat
• lose vs miss
• remember vs remind
• hope vs wish
• meet vs know
• wear vs dress
• use vs wear
• find vs find out
• look for vs find
• look at vs look for
• look like vs be like
• its vs it's
• your vs you're
• their vs they're vs there
• whose vs who's
• then vs than
• to vs too vs two
• who vs whom
• everyday vs every day
• maybe vs may be
• already vs all ready
• altogether vs all together
• any more vs anymore
• a lot vs allot
• apart vs a part
• every one vs everyone
• each other vs one another
• fewer vs less
• number vs amount
• many vs much
• few vs little
• some vs any
• another vs other
• between vs among
• beside vs besides
• during vs while
• until vs by
• especially vs specially
• hard vs hardly
• late vs lately
• near vs nearly
• high vs highly
• close vs closely
• direct vs directly
• free vs freely
• each vs every
• all vs whole
• most vs mostly