Which to use
“bento” and “berth” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #41,526
- “bento” frequency rank
- #16,179
- “berth” frequency rank
- 57705
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | bento | berth |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | A Japanese takeaway lunch served in a box, often with the food arranged into an elaborate design. | Chiefly in wide berth: a sufficient space in the water for a ship or other vessel to lie at anchor or manoeuvre without getting in the way of other vessels, or colliding into rocks or the shore. |
Where the eye mixes bento and berth
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.
Why the eye confuses bento with berth
A purely visual mix-up. bento (/ˈbɛntəʊ/) and berth (/bɜːθ/) 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 57705, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
bento is recorded at frequency rank #41,526, classified as anoun, pronounced /ˈbɛntəʊ/. berth is at rank #16,179, tagged as anoun, pronounced /bɜːθ/.
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 57705, this pair ranks #117,591 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of bento vs berth
Shared letters: bet. Private to "bento": no. Private to "berth": hr.
"bento" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV · "berth" · 5 letters · shape CVCCC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "bento" and "berth" mean the same thing in a sentence?
In ordinary English text, does "bento" or "berth" show up more?
Useful next steps
Eye-level mix-up between "bento" and "berth" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.
- Full dictionary entry for "bento" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "berth" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #117,591 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "bento" and "berth" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "bendy vs bento". 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 #117,591 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.