feastvsfewestConfusable pair

Quick tell: feast is a noun, fewest is a determiner, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“feast” is a noun and “fewest” is a determiner - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#7,689
“feast” frequency rank
#27,834
“fewest” frequency rank
35523
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature feast fewest
Definition A holiday, festival, especially a religious one superlative degree of few; the smallest number.

Letter map: feast vs fewest

Shared letters muted; letters that set feast and fewest apart highlighted. Shared run: 4. feast runs 5 letters (CVVCC) against fewest's 6 (CVCVCC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

5 ch
feast
6 ch
fewest

Role in the sentence - feast and fewest

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: feast is anoun and fewestadeterminer. On the page they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 35523, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

feast is recorded at frequency rank #7,689, classified as anoun, pronounced /fiːst/. fewest is at rank #27,834, tagged as adet.

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 35523, this pair ranks #311,215 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of feast vs fewest

Shared letters: efst. Private to "feast": a. Private to "fewest": w.

"feast" · 5 letters · shape CVVCC  ·  "fewest" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • feast ← efast · faest · feasst · feastt · feats · fesat · ffeast
  • fewest ← efwest · feewst · fewesst · fewestt · fewets · fewset · fewwest · ffewest

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "feast" and "fewest" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "feast" is a noun and "fewest" a determiner, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "feast" vs "fewest" - which ranks higher?
"feast" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #7,689 in our English list, against #27,834 for "fewest". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

You've compared "feast" and "fewest". Here's where to go from here.

  • Full dictionary entry for "feast" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "fewest" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #311,215 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "feast" and "fewest" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "fealty vs feast". 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 #311,215 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