copsvscoupWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: cops is a verb, coup is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“cops” is a verb and “coup” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#13,118
“cops” frequency rank
#16,671
“coup” frequency rank
29789
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature cops coup
Definition 3. Person Singular Indikativ Präsens Aktiv des Verbs cop Treffen, Anschlag, Hieb, Schlag, Streich

Letter map: cops vs coup

Shared letters muted; letters that set cops and coup apart highlighted. Shared run: 3.

4 ch
cops
4 ch
coup

Part-of-speech tell for cops / coup

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: cops is averb and coupanoun. On the page they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 29789, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

cops is recorded at frequency rank #13,118, classified as averb, pronounced […]. coup is at rank #16,671, tagged as anoun, pronounced [ku].

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 29789, this pair ranks #1,760,279 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of cops vs coup

Shared letters: cop. Private to "cops": s. Private to "coup": u.

"cops" · 4 letters · shape CVCC  ·  "coup" · 4 letters · shape CVVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • copsccops · copps · copss · cosp · cpos · ocps
  • coupccoup · copu · coupp · cuop · ocup

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "cops" and "coup" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "cops" is a verb and "coup" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "cops" vs "coup" - which ranks higher?
"cops" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #13,118 in our German list, against #16,671 for "coup". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

You've compared "cops" and "coup". Here's where to go from here.

  • Full dictionary entry for "cops" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "coup" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,760,279 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "cops" and "coup" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "coli vs coup". 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 #1,760,279 of 2,006,359 scored German pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list