Dunnock or House Sparrow?
These two get mixed up constantly. Here is what actually separates them, taken from each bird's own page.
Dunnock
Prunella modularis
The bill decides it, every time. A dunnock has a fine, sharp, needle-like bill for picking insects out of leaf litter; a house sparrow has a thick, blunt, conical bill built to crack seed, and on a male it turns black in the breeding season. Everything else follows from that. The dunnock is soft grey on the face and breast with no bold markings at all, while a male house sparrow has a grey crown, chestnut nape and a black bib, and a female sparrow has a clear pale stripe running back from behind the eye that a dunnock never shows. Behaviour seals it: dunnocks creep alone along the ground with the body low, while house sparrows are gregarious, noisy and rarely seen singly. If it is on the feeder, in a crowd, chirping, it is a sparrow.
House Sparrow
Passer domesticus
Bill shape settles it. The dunnock has a fine, sharp, insect-eater's bill; the house sparrow has a thick, blunt, conical seed-cracker. The dunnock is also greyer about the head and shuffles alone along the ground rather than feeding in a flock.
Side by side
| Dunnock | House Sparrow | |
|---|---|---|
| Size | Almost exactly robin-sized at 14cm, but held lower and flatter, so it looks smaller. | Robin-sized at 14–15cm, but chunkier, flatter-headed and thicker-billed |
| Where you'll see it | On the ground under hedges, shrubs and feeders; very rarely on the feeder itself. | Feeders, dense hedges, gutters and roof eaves — rarely far from a building |
| What it eats | Small insects, spiders and other invertebrates, plus very small seeds in winter. | Seeds and grain all year; adults switch to insects to feed chicks |
| When | Resident all year, and one of the few garden birds you can find singing in January. | Resident, all twelve months |
| Status | Amber listed | Red listed |
Still not sure? Describe what you saw and we will rank every garden bird against it — including these two.
Both descriptions are taken from the species pages, which cite the BTO and RSPB. Reviewed 2026-09-20.