chasingvsclawingTell them apart

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

Which to use

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

#5,864
“chasing” frequency rank
#41,560
“clawing” frequency rank
47424
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature chasing clawing
Definition present participle and gerund of chase A scratch with the claws.

Letter map: chasing vs clawing

Shared letters muted; letters that set chasing and clawing apart highlighted. Shared run: 5.

7 ch
chasing
7 ch
clawing

Grammar separator: chasing vs clawing

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: chasing is averb and clawinganoun. On the page they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 47424, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

chasing is recorded at frequency rank #5,864, classified as averb, pronounced /ˈt͡ʃeɪsɪŋ/. clawing is at rank #41,560, tagged as anoun.

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 47424, this pair ranks #202,604 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of chasing vs clawing

Shared letters: acgin. Private to "chasing": hs. Private to "clawing": lw.

"chasing" · 7 letters · shape CCVCVCC  ·  "clawing" · 7 letters · shape CCVCVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • chasingcahsing · cchasing · chaisng · chasign · chasingg · chasinng · chasnig · chassing
  • clawingcalwing · cclawing · claiwng · clawign · clawingg · clawinng · clawnig · clawwing

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "chasing" and "clawing" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "chasing" is a verb and "clawing" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary English text, does "chasing" or "clawing" show up more?
"chasing" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #5,864 in our English list, against #41,560 for "clawing". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

You've compared "chasing" and "clawing". Here's where to go from here.

  • Full dictionary entry for "chasing" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "clawing" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #202,604 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "chasing" and "clawing" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "chafing vs clawing". 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 #202,604 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