codvscrudWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#8,399
“cod” frequency rank
#45,306
“crud” frequency rank
53705
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature cod crud
Definition A type of sea fish or the meat from said fish. Dirt, filth or refuse.

Where the eye mixes cod and crud

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

3 ch
cod
4 ch
crud

Why the eye confuses cod with crud

A purely visual mix-up. cod (/kɒd/) and crud (/kɹʌd/) 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 53705, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

cod is recorded at frequency rank #8,399, classified as anoun, pronounced /kɒd/. crud is at rank #45,306, tagged as anoun, pronounced /kɹʌd/.

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 53705, this pair ranks #146,850 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of cod vs crud

Shared letters: cd. Private to "cod": o. Private to "crud": ru.

"cod" · 3 letters · shape CVC  ·  "crud" · 4 letters · shape CCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • crudccrud · crdu · crrud · crudd · rcud

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "cod" and "crud" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (/kɒd/ versus /kɹʌd/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "cod" vs "crud" - which ranks higher?
"cod" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #8,399 in our English list, against #45,306 for "crud". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.

  • Full dictionary entry for "cod" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "crud" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #146,850 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "cod" and "crud" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "crud vs CVD". 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 #146,850 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