casvsclashWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: cas is a adjective, clash is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“cas” is an adjective and “clash” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#14,713
“cas” frequency rank
#7,430
“clash” frequency rank
22143
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature cas clash
Definition Abbreviation of casual. A loud sound, like the crashing together of metal objects; a crash.

Where the eye mixes cas and clash

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

3 ch
cas
5 ch
clash

Visual trap between cas and clash

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: cas is /kæʒ/ while clash is /klaʃ/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 2 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (adjective vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 22143, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

cas is recorded at frequency rank #14,713, classified as anadj, pronounced /kæʒ/. clash is at rank #7,430, tagged as anoun, pronounced /klaʃ/.

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 22143, this pair ranks #418,744 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of cas vs clash

Shared letters: acs. Private to "cas": -. Private to "clash": hl.

"cas" · 3 letters · shape CVC  ·  "clash" · 5 letters · shape CCVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • clashcalsh · cclash · clahs · clashh · classh · cllash · clsah · lcash

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "cas" for "clash" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "cas" is an adjective and "clash" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary English text, does "cas" or "clash" show up more?
"clash" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #7,430 in our English list, against #14,713 for "cas". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "cas" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "clash" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #418,744 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "cas" and "clash" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "cas vs CGT". 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 #418,744 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