Which to use
“food” and “foxy” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #386
- “food” frequency rank
- #28,925
- “foxy” frequency rank
- 29311
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | food | foxy |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Any solid substance that can be consumed by living organisms, especially by eating, in order to sustain life. | The recreational drug 5-methoxy-dimethyltryptamine (5-MeO-DMT). |
Where the eye mixes food and foxy
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.
Visual trap between food and foxy
A purely visual mix-up. food (/fuːd/) and foxy (/ˈfɑksi/) 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 29311, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
food is recorded at frequency rank #386, classified as anoun, pronounced /fuːd/. foxy is at rank #28,925, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ˈfɑksi/.
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 29311, this pair ranks #364,019 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of food vs foxy
Shared letters: fo. Private to "food": d. Private to "foxy": xy.
"food" · 4 letters · shape CVVC · "foxy" · 4 letters · shape CVCV
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "food" for "foxy" ever safe?
Which is more common, "food" or "foxy"?
Useful next steps
Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.
- Full dictionary entry for "food" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "foxy" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #364,019 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "food" and "foxy" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "FOMO vs foxy". 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 #364,019 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.