breadthvsbreastsWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#15,579
“breadth” frequency rank
#7,774
“breasts” frequency rank
23353
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature breadth breasts
Definition The extent or measure of how broad or wide something is; width. plural of breast

Where the eye mixes breadth and breasts

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence.

7 ch
breadth
7 ch
breasts

Visual trap between breadth and breasts

A purely visual mix-up. breadth (/bɹɛdθ/) and breasts (/bɹɛsts/) 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 23353, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

breadth is recorded at frequency rank #15,579, classified as anoun, pronounced /bɹɛdθ/. breasts is at rank #7,774, tagged as anoun, pronounced /bɹɛsts/.

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 23353, this pair ranks #409,916 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of breadth vs breasts

Shared letters: abert. Private to "breadth": dh. Private to "breasts": s.

"breadth" · 7 letters · shape CCVVCCC  ·  "breasts" · 7 letters · shape CCVVCCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • breadthbbreadth · beradth · braedth · breaddth · breadht · breadthh · breadtth · breatdh
  • breastsbbreasts · berasts · braests · breassts · breastss · breastts · breatss · bresats

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "breadth" for "breasts" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (/bɹɛdθ/ versus /bɹɛsts/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "breadth" vs "breasts" - which ranks higher?
"breasts" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #7,774 in our English list, against #15,579 for "breadth". 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 "breadth" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "breasts" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #409,916 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "breadth" and "breasts" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "bests vs breasts". 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 #409,916 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