CUPvscupsConfusable pair

Quick tell: CUP is a abbrev, cups is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“CUP” is an abbrev and “cups” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#3,431
“CUP” frequency rank
#18,850
“cups” frequency rank
22281
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature CUP cups
Definition internationaler Währungscode für kubanischer Peso, die Währung von Kuba Plural des Substantivs cup

Letter map: CUP vs cups

Shared letters muted; letters that set CUP and cups apart highlighted. Shared run: 3.

3 ch
CUP
4 ch
cups

Part-of-speech tell for CUP / cups

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: CUP is anabbrev and cupsanoun. On the page they differ by 1 extra letter(s) - “CUP” sits inside “cups”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 22281, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

CUP is recorded at frequency rank #3,431, classified as anabbrev. cups is at rank #18,850, tagged as anoun, pronounced […].

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 22281, this pair ranks #1,876,096 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of CUP vs cups

Shared letters: cpu. Private to "CUP": -. Private to "cups": s.

"CUP" · 3 letters · shape CVC  ·  "cups" · 4 letters · shape CVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • cupsccups · cupps · cupss · cusp · ucps

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "CUP" for "cups" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "CUP" is an abbrev and "cups" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary German text, does "CUP" or "cups" show up more?
"CUP" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #3,431 in our German list, against #18,850 for "cups". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Pair "CUP" vs "cups" is on the table, pick a follow-up below.

  • Full dictionary entry for "CUP" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "cups" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,876,096 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "CUP" and "cups" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "cups vs puzzles". 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 #1,876,096 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