cashvscawWhat's the difference?

Which to use

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

#1,264
“cash” frequency rank
#48,655
“caw” frequency rank
49919
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature cash caw
Definition Money in the form of notes or bills and coins, as opposed to checks, credit or electronic transactions. The harsh cry of a crow.

Where the eye mixes cash and caw

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

4 ch
cash
3 ch
caw

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

A purely visual mix-up. cash (/kæʃ/) and caw (/kɔː/) 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 49919, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

cash is recorded at frequency rank #1,264, classified as anoun, pronounced /kæʃ/. caw is at rank #48,655, tagged as anoun, pronounced /kɔː/.

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 49919, this pair ranks #179,057 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of cash vs caw

Shared letters: ac. Private to "cash": hs. Private to "caw": w.

"cash" · 4 letters · shape CVCC  ·  "caw" · 3 letters · shape CVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • cashacsh · cahs · cashh · cassh · ccash · csah

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "cash" and "caw" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently (/kæʃ/ versus /kɔː/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "cash" or "caw"?
"cash" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #1,264 in our English list, against #48,655 for "caw". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list