English homophones
crewed/crude
"crude" (#7,115 written frequency) beats "crewed" (#49,848) in this 2-word /kɹuːd/ cluster. Size rank #133 of 1,007 English groups.
Data vintage
Frequency splits the cluster
These 2 spellings keep the same /kɹuːd/ reading, but written frequency splits them hard: "crude" leads at #7,115, with "crewed" trailing at #49,848.
Spelling pairs in this cluster
- Shared stem "cr" then splits - "crewed" (6 letters) vs "crude" (5).
Orthographic DNA of this cluster
Shared letters across crewed, crude: cder. Private letters are the ones only one spelling owns: the eye's fastest tell once sound is out of the picture.
crewed
6 letters · 2 vowels · shape CCVCVC
Inventory cderw · private w
crude
5 letters · 2 vowels · shape CCVCV
Inventory cderu · private u
Pick the spelling from the meaning
- Write "crewed" when you mean: Having a crew; manned; piloted.
- Write "crude" when you mean: In a natural, untreated state.
Known mistypes of these spellings
Edit-distance variants recorded against this cluster: useful when a search or OCR feed lands on the wrong form.
Each spelling
Nearby English homophone groups
What to do next
You've reviewed the 2-spelling cluster (crewed, crude). Here's where to go from here.
- "crude" is the most frequent headword in this 2-spelling cluster (rank #7,115 in English). Full entry
- Among English homophone groups, a cluster of 2 spellings ranks #133 by size (1,007 groups in this vintage). Corpus statistics
- Explore a nearby 2-spelling cluster: coal · cole. Nearby cluster
- Each spelling in "crewed, crude" has its own headword page with definition, IPA, and misspelling variants. First entry
PlainSpell is a reference corpus, not spelling advice. Verify unusual forms in context.