cedevscineConfusable pair

Quick tell: cede is a verb, cine is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“cede” is a verb and “cine” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#34,425
“cede” frequency rank
#40,614
“cine” frequency rank
75039
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature cede cine
Definition To give up; yield to another. cinefilm

Where the eye mixes cede and cine

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence. cede and cine follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCV). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

4 ch
cede
4 ch
cine

Why the eye confuses cede with cine

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: cede is /siːd/ while cine is /ˈsɪni/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (verb vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 75039, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

cede is recorded at frequency rank #34,425, classified as averb, pronounced /siːd/. cine is at rank #40,614, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ˈsɪni/.

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 75039, this pair ranks #34,405 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of cede vs cine

Shared letters: ce. Private to "cede": d. Private to "cine": in.

"cede" · 4 letters · shape CVCV  ·  "cine" · 4 letters · shape CVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • cede ← ccede · cdee · ceed · ecde
  • cine ← ccine · cien · cinne · cnie

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "cede" and "cine" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "cede" is a verb and "cine" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "cede" or "cine"?
"cede" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #34,425 in our English list, against #40,614 for "cine". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Eye-level mix-up between "cede" and "cine" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "cede" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "cine" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #34,405 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "cede" and "cine" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "cine vs cuny". 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 #34,405 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