Which to use
“cate” is a noun and “catty” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #25,700
- “cate” frequency rank
- #49,246
- “catty” frequency rank
- 74946
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | cate | catty |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | A delicacy or item of food. | With subtle hostility in an effort to hurt, annoy, or upset, particularly among women. |
Where the eye mixes cate and catty
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. cate runs 4 letters (CVCV) against catty's 5 (CVCCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Look-alike desk: cate vs catty
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: cate is /keɪt/ while catty is /ˈkæti/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 74946, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
cate is recorded at frequency rank #25,700, classified as anoun, pronounced /keɪt/. catty is at rank #49,246, tagged as anadj, pronounced /ˈkæti/.
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 74946, this pair ranks #34,687 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of cate vs catty
Shared letters: act. Private to "cate": e. Private to "catty": y.
"cate" · 4 letters · shape CVCV · "catty" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "cate" for "catty" ever safe?
Frequency check: "cate" vs "catty" - which ranks higher?
What to do next
Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.
- Full dictionary entry for "cate" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "catty" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #34,687 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "cate" and "catty" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "cates vs catty". 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 #34,687 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.