scratchvssedTell them apart

Quick tell: scratch is a verb, sed is a conjunction, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“scratch” is a verb and “sed” is a conjunction - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#43,485
“scratch” frequency rank
#5,221
“sed” frequency rank
48706
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature scratch sed
Definition kratzen aber, wobei, sondern; jedoch

Letter map: scratch vs sed

Shared letters muted; letters that set scratch and sed apart highlighted. Shared run: 1.

7 ch
scratch
3 ch
sed

Part-of-speech tell for scratch / sed

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: scratch is averb and sedaconjunction. On the page they differ by 4 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 48706, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

scratch is recorded at frequency rank #43,485, classified as averb, pronounced […]. sed is at rank #5,221, tagged as aconj, 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 48706, this pair ranks #1,238,656 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of scratch vs sed

Shared letters: s. Private to "scratch": achrt. Private to "sed": de.

"scratch" · 7 letters · shape CCCVCCC  ·  "sed" · 3 letters · shape CVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • scratchcsratch · scartch · sccratch · scracth · scratcch · scratchh · scrathc · scrattch

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "scratch" and "sed" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "scratch" is a verb and "sed" a conjunction, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "scratch" or "sed"?
"sed" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #5,221 in our German list, against #43,485 for "scratch". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "scratch" and "sed".

  • Full dictionary entry for "scratch" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "sed" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,238,656 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "scratch" and "sed" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "puzzles vs scratch". 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 #1,238,656 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