foodvstapesTell them apart

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

Which to use

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

#7,045
“food” frequency rank
#41,496
“tapes” frequency rank
48541
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature food tapes
Definition jede Substanz die von Menschen, Pflanzen oder Tieren aufgenommen wird, um das Überleben und das Wachstum zu ermöglichen, Nahrung 2. Person Singular Präsens Konjunktiv des Verbs tapar

Letter map: food vs tapes

Shared letters muted; letters that set food and tapes apart highlighted. No shared letter run. food runs 4 letters (CVVC) against tapes's 5 (CVCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

4 ch
food
5 ch
tapes

Role in the sentence - food and tapes

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: food is anoun and tapesaverb. On the page they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 48541, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

food is recorded at frequency rank #7,045, classified as anoun, pronounced […]. tapes is at rank #41,496, tagged as averb, 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 48541, this pair ranks #1,244,718 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of food vs tapes

Shared letters: none. Private to "food": dfo. Private to "tapes": aepst.

"food" · 4 letters · shape CVVC  ·  "tapes" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • foodffood · fod · fodo · foodd · ofod
  • tapesatpes · taeps · tapess · tappes · tapse · tpaes · ttapes

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "food" and "tapes" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "food" is a noun and "tapes" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "food" vs "tapes" - which ranks higher?
"food" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #7,045 in our German list, against #41,496 for "tapes". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

You've compared "food" and "tapes". Here's where to go from here.

  • Full dictionary entry for "food" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "tapes" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,244,718 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "food" and "tapes" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "puzzles vs tapes". 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 #1,244,718 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