calvscragTell them apart

Which to use

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

#6,995
“cal” frequency rank
#44,715
“crag” frequency rank
51710
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature cal crag
Definition Clipping of calorie. A rocky outcrop; a rugged steep cliff or rock.

Where the eye mixes cal and crag

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

3 ch
cal
4 ch
crag

Why the eye confuses cal with crag

A purely visual mix-up. cal (/kæl/) and crag (/kɹæɡ/) 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 51710, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

cal is recorded at frequency rank #6,995, classified as anoun, pronounced /kæl/. crag is at rank #44,715, tagged as anoun, pronounced /kɹæɡ/.

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 51710, this pair ranks #163,184 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of cal vs crag

Shared letters: ac. Private to "cal": l. Private to "crag": gr.

"cal" · 3 letters · shape CVC  ·  "crag" · 4 letters · shape CCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • cragccrag · cragg · crga · crrag · rcag

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "cal" for "crag" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (/kæl/ versus /kɹæɡ/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "cal" or "crag"?
"cal" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #6,995 in our English list, against #44,715 for "crag". 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 "cal" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "crag" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #163,184 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "cal" and "crag" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "crag vs Croat". 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 #163,184 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