Which to use
“crane” and “crone” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #8,021
- “crane” frequency rank
- #47,002
- “crone” frequency rank
- 55023
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | crane | crone |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Any bird of the family Gruidae, large birds with long legs and a long neck which is extended during flight. | An old woman. |
Where the eye mixes crane and crone
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. crane and crone follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CCVCV). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.
Visual trap between crane and crone
A purely visual mix-up. crane (/kɹeɪn/) and crone (/kɹoʊn/) 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 a single letter - a in “crane” becomes o in “crone”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 55023, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
crane is recorded at frequency rank #8,021, classified as anoun, pronounced /kɹeɪn/. crone is at rank #47,002, tagged as anoun, pronounced /kɹoʊn/.
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 55023, this pair ranks #136,722 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of crane vs crone
Shared letters: cenr. Private to "crane": a. Private to "crone": o.
"crane" · 5 letters · shape CCVCV · "crone" · 5 letters · shape CCVCV
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "crane" for "crone" ever safe?
Frequency check: "crane" vs "crone" - which ranks higher?
What to do next
Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.
- Full dictionary entry for "crane" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "crone" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #136,722 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "crane" and "crone" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Croat vs crone". 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 #136,722 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.