cracksvscrapsTell them apart

Which to use

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

#8,267
“cracks” frequency rank
#36,939
“craps” frequency rank
45206
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature cracks craps
Definition plural of crack A game of gambling, or chance, where the players throw dice to make scores and avoid crap.

Where the eye mixes cracks and craps

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

6 ch
cracks
5 ch
craps

Visual trap between cracks and craps

A purely visual mix-up. cracks (/kɹæks/) and craps (/kɹæps/) 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 45206, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

cracks is recorded at frequency rank #8,267, classified as anoun, pronounced /kɹæks/. craps is at rank #36,939, tagged as anoun, pronounced /kɹæps/.

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 45206, this pair ranks #223,405 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of cracks vs craps

Shared letters: acrs. Private to "cracks": k. Private to "craps": p.

"cracks" · 6 letters · shape CCVCCC  ·  "craps" · 5 letters · shape CCVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • crackscarcks · ccracks · craccks · crackks · crackss · cracsk · crakcs · crcaks
  • crapscarps · ccraps · crapps · crapss · crasp · crpas · crraps · rcaps

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "cracks" for "craps" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (/kɹæks/ versus /kɹæps/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "cracks" or "craps"?
"cracks" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #8,267 in our English list, against #36,939 for "craps". 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 "cracks" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "craps" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #223,405 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "cracks" and "craps" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Crabb vs craps". 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 #223,405 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