cravenvscrazedConfusable pair

Which to use

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

#22,633
“craven” frequency rank
#24,130
“crazed” frequency rank
46763
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature craven crazed
Definition Unwilling to fight; lacking even the rudiments of courage; extremely cowardly. Maddened; driven insane.

Where the eye mixes craven and crazed

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. craven and crazed follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CCVCVC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

6 ch
craven
6 ch
crazed

Why the eye confuses craven with crazed

A purely visual mix-up. craven (/ˈkɹeɪ.vən/) and crazed (/kɹeɪzd/) 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 46763, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

craven is recorded at frequency rank #22,633, classified as anadj, pronounced /ˈkɹeɪ.vən/. crazed is at rank #24,130, tagged as anadj, pronounced /kɹeɪzd/.

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 46763, this pair ranks #208,704 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of craven vs crazed

Shared letters: acer. Private to "craven": nv. Private to "crazed": dz.

"craven" · 6 letters · shape CCVCVC  ·  "crazed" · 6 letters · shape CCVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • craven ← carven · ccraven · craevn · cravenn · cravne · cravven · crraven · crvaen
  • crazed ← carzed · ccrazed · craezd · crazde · crazedd · crazzed · crrazed · crzaed

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "craven" and "crazed" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently (/ˈkɹeɪ.vən/ versus /kɹeɪzd/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "craven" vs "crazed" - which ranks higher?
"craven" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #22,633 in our English list, against #24,130 for "crazed". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "craven" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "crazed" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #208,704 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "craven" and "crazed" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "crazed vs crewed". 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 #208,704 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