Which to use
“fast” is an adjective and “foot” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #767
- “fast” frequency rank
- #1,426
- “foot” frequency rank
- 2193
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | fast | foot |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Firmly or securely fixed in place; stable. | A biological structure found in many animals that is used for locomotion and that is frequently a separate organ at the terminal part of the leg. |
Where the eye mixes fast and foot
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: fast is /fɑːst/ while foot is /fʊt/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (adjective vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 2193, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
fast is recorded at frequency rank #767, classified as anadj, pronounced /fɑːst/. foot is at rank #1,426, tagged as anoun, pronounced /fʊt/.
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 2193, this pair ranks #525,628 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of fast vs foot
Shared letters: ft. Private to "fast": as. Private to "foot": o.
"fast" · 4 letters · shape CVCC · "foot" · 4 letters · shape CVVC