feevsFTSEConfusable pair

Quick tell: fee is a noun, FTSE is a name, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“fee” is a noun and “FTSE” is a name - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#2,947
“fee” frequency rank
#38,851
“FTSE” frequency rank
41798
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature fee FTSE
Definition An amount charged for a privilege. Financial Times and Stock Exchange.

Where the eye mixes fee and FTSE

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.

3 ch
fee
4 ch
FTSE

Look-alike desk: fee vs FTSE

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: fee is /fiː/ while FTSE is /ˈfʊt.si/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs name), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 41798, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

fee is recorded at frequency rank #2,947, classified as anoun, pronounced /fiː/. FTSE is at rank #38,851, tagged as aname, pronounced /ˈfʊt.si/.

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 41798, this pair ranks #255,094 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of fee vs FTSE

Shared letters: ef. Private to "fee": -. Private to "FTSE": st.

"fee" · 3 letters · shape CVV  ·  "FTSE" · 4 letters · shape CCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • FTSEfftse · fste · ftes · ftsse · fttse · tfse

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "fee" for "FTSE" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "fee" is a noun and "FTSE" a name, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary English text, does "fee" or "FTSE" show up more?
"fee" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #2,947 in our English list, against #38,851 for "FTSE". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

After this comparison

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "fee" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "FTSE" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #255,094 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "fee" and "FTSE" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "fie vs FTSE". 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 #255,094 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