barthvsburghWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#33,945
“barth” frequency rank
#34,413
“burgh” frequency rank
68358
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature barth burgh
Definition A place of shelter for cattle. a small mound, often used in reference to tumuli (mostly restricted to place names).

Where the eye mixes barth and burgh

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.

5 ch
barth
5 ch
burgh

Visual trap between barth and burgh

A purely visual mix-up. barth (/bɑː(ɹ)θ/) and burgh (/ˈbʌɹə/) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 68358, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

barth is recorded at frequency rank #33,945, classified as anoun, pronounced /bɑː(ɹ)θ/. burgh is at rank #34,413, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ˈbʌɹə/.

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 68358, this pair ranks #59,218 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of barth vs burgh

Shared letters: bhr. Private to "barth": at. Private to "burgh": gu.

"barth" · 5 letters · shape CVCCC  ·  "burgh" · 5 letters · shape CVCCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • barthabrth · barht · barrth · barthh · bartth · batrh · bbarth · brath
  • burghbburgh · brugh · bugrh · burggh · burghh · burhg · burrgh · ubrgh

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "barth" and "burgh" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently (/bɑː(ɹ)θ/ versus /ˈbʌɹə/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary English text, does "barth" or "burgh" show up more?
"barth" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #33,945 in our English list, against #34,413 for "burgh". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "barth" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "burgh" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #59,218 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "barth" and "burgh" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "barth vs batt". 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 #59,218 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