25 Words That English Speakers Often Confuse

Fewer is used when talking about things that can be counted. For example, Mike has fewer water bottles than Rob (not less because you can count water bottles). Less is for things that can’t be counted. Mike has less water than Rob (not fewer because you can’t count waters).

Capital refers to the city while capitol refers to the building. To remember just try to imagine the “o” as being the dome on top of the building.

Disinterested is an adjective that means unbiased while uninterested refers to someone who is not interested.

“It’s” is the contraction of “it is” while “its” indicates possession. People often confuse these because typically an apostrophe indicates possession after a noun.

The letters e.g. are a latin abbreviation meaning “etcetera” while i.e. is a latin abbreviation meaning “that is”. If you are giving examples or listing options use e.g. (Mark hates fruit, e.g. bananas, oranges, berries). If you are clarifying something use i.e. (Mark missed school, i.e. he was sick).

You borrow money “from” people, you don’t borrow money “to” people. You lend money to people.

Criterion is singular while criteria is plural.

Among is used for three or more while between is used for two.

Aid is help given to people while an aide is a person who helps.

A desert is a barren wasteland with little or no precipitation. A dessert is sweet food eaten after a main meal.

A principal is the head of a school while a principle is a belief.

“May be” as two words means “might be”. “Maybe” as one word means “perhaps”. If you have any questions about their meaning just substitute their synonymous meanings in. For example, “the shirt may be (might be) on the couch” vs “maybe (perhaps) the shirt is on the couch”.

Breath is the noun. Breathe is the verb.

Stationary means “still”. Stationery is writing materials such as paper.

Lay is a transitive verb. This means it needs an object. For example, Mike (the subject) can lay a book (the object) down. The verb makes no sense without an object though. To say “Mike lays down” is incomplete. Mike lays what down? For this scenario, the word you are looking for is the intransitive verb “lie”. “Mike (the subject) lies down”. No object is required.

Farther is used with distance, as in “how much farther?”. Further means “additional”, as in “can you give me further directions?”.

Hanged is the past tense of hang if you are talking about hanging somebody, as in an execution. Therefore, outlaws were hanged in the wild west. Hung, on the other hand, refers to things, not people.

Although they mean similar things, “a while” is a noun phrase that typically follows a preposition (He said that he would be home for a while). Awhile is an adverb that basically captures the preposition in its meaning. For example, you could restate the above sentence as such: “He said that he would be home awhile.”

Each other refers to two objects. One another should be used if there are more than two.

For most cases “won’t” is the correct choice. It is a contraction of “will not”. Wont, however, is actually a word as well. It means “to be used to”. For example, Ryan was wont to doing his homework right after school. This word is not as common though.

Who’s is the contraction of “who is”. Whose is the possessive form of “who”. To tell which one you should use just substitute “who is” into the sentence and see if it makes sense.

Divers is an archaic adjective meaning “many” or “several”. Diverse means “varied”.

These prefixes are hard to use. “Semi” always means half. “Bi”, however, can mean “every two” or “twice”. So the prefix “bi” is ambiguous. Biweekly could mean twice a week or every two weeks. If you mean the former, then you can use “semi” in order to avoid the ambiguity. With years, however, the rules change. “Biannual” always means twice a year. If you want to say that something happens every two years then you need to use the special word “biennial”.

Sometime refers to an indeterminate time in the future (e.g. He will go to school sometime next year). Sometimes is an adverb meaning occasionally, as in “He goes to school sometimes”. Some time is a phrase that refers to a period of time. For example, “He has already spent quite some time in school”.

A lot is a phrase that means “much”. Allot is actually a verb that means “to give or apportion something to someone”.