corpsevscoupleConfusable pair

Which to use

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

#10,184
“corpse” frequency rank
#651
“couple” frequency rank
10835
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature corpse couple
Definition A dead body, especially that of a human as opposed to an animal. Two of the same kind connected or considered together.

Where the eye mixes corpse and couple

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence.

6 ch
corpse
6 ch
couple

Visual trap between corpse and couple

A purely visual mix-up. corpse (/kɔːps/) and couple (/ˈkʌp.əl/) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 10835, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

corpse is recorded at frequency rank #10,184, classified as anoun, pronounced /kɔːps/. couple is at rank #651, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ˈkʌp.əl/.

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 10835, this pair ranks #490,276 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of corpse vs couple

Shared letters: ceop. Private to "corpse": rs. Private to "couple": lu.

"corpse" · 6 letters · shape CVCCCV  ·  "couple" · 6 letters · shape CVVCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • corpseccorpse · coprse · corpes · corppse · corpsse · corrpse · corspe · cropse
  • coupleccouple · copule · coulpe · coupel · couplle · coupple · cuople · ocuple

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "corpse" for "couple" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (/kɔːps/ versus /ˈkʌp.əl/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "corpse" vs "couple" - which ranks higher?
"couple" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #651 in our English list, against #10,184 for "corpse". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

What to do next

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "corpse" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "couple" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #490,276 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "corpse" and "couple" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "corpse vs Corso". 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 #490,276 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