bakavsbarTell them apart

Which to use

“baka” and “bar” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#44,633
“baka” frequency rank
#1,213
“bar” frequency rank
45846
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature baka bar
Definition An evil spirit in Haitian belief, often in the form of an animal. A solid, more or less rigid object of metal or wood with a uniform cross-section smaller than its length.

Where the eye mixes baka and bar

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.

4 ch
baka
3 ch
bar

Visual trap between baka and bar

A purely visual mix-up. baka (/ˈbɑːkə/) and bar (/bɑː/) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 45846, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

baka is recorded at frequency rank #44,633, classified as anoun, pronounced /ˈbɑːkə/. bar is at rank #1,213, tagged as anoun, pronounced /bɑː/.

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 45846, this pair ranks #217,342 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of baka vs bar

Shared letters: ab. Private to "baka": k. Private to "bar": r.

"baka" · 4 letters · shape CVCV  ·  "bar" · 3 letters · shape CVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • bakaabka · baak · bakka · bbaka · bkaa

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "baka" and "bar" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently (/ˈbɑːkə/ versus /bɑː/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "baka" vs "bar" - which ranks higher?
"bar" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #1,213 in our English list, against #44,633 for "baka". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

After this comparison

Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.

  • Full dictionary entry for "baka" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "bar" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #217,342 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "baka" and "bar" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "baka vs Bau". 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 #217,342 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list