Which to use
“coups” and “court” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #33,995
- “coups” frequency rank
- #370
- “court” frequency rank
- 34365
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | coups | court |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | plural of coup | An enclosed space; a courtyard; an uncovered area shut in by the walls of a building, or by different buildings; also, a space opening from a street and nearly surrounded by houses; a blind alley. |
Where the eye mixes coups and court
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. coups and court follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVVCC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.
Why the eye confuses coups with court
A purely visual mix-up. coups (/kuːz/) and court (/kɔːt/) 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 34365, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
coups is recorded at frequency rank #33,995, classified as anoun, pronounced /kuːz/. court is at rank #370, tagged as anoun, pronounced /kɔːt/.
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 34365, this pair ranks #321,482 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of coups vs court
Shared letters: cou. Private to "coups": ps. Private to "court": rt.
"coups" · 5 letters · shape CVVCC · "court" · 5 letters · shape CVVCC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Can "coups" and "court" be used interchangeably?
In ordinary English text, does "coups" or "court" show up more?
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 "coups" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "court" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #321,482 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "coups" and "court" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "coups vs Coutts". 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 #321,482 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.