Which to use
“care” and “career” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #247
- “care” frequency rank
- #896
- “career” frequency rank
- 1143
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | care | career |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Close attention; concern; responsibility. | One’s calling in life; one's working occupation or profession, especially when pursued seriously or over a long period of time. |
Where the eye mixes care and career
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence.
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
A purely visual mix-up. care (/kɛə/) and career (/kəˈɹɪə/) 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 2 extra letter(s) - “care” sits inside “career”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 1143, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
care is recorded at frequency rank #247, classified as anoun, pronounced /kɛə/. career is at rank #896, tagged as anoun, pronounced /kəˈɹɪə/.
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 1143, this pair ranks #528,005 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of care vs career
Shared letters: acer. Private to "care": -. Private to "career": -.
"care" · 4 letters · shape CVCV · "career" · 6 letters · shape CVCVVC