hydratevshydratedWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: hydrate is a noun, hydrated is a verb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“hydrate” is a noun and “hydrated” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#27,875
“hydrate” frequency rank
#20,386
“hydrated” frequency rank
48261
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature hydrate hydrated
Definition A solid compound containing or linked to water molecules. simple past and past participle of hydrate

Letter map: hydrate vs hydrated

Shared letters muted; letters that set hydrate and hydrated apart highlighted. Shared run: 7.

7 ch
hydrate
8 ch
hydrated

Role in the sentence - hydrate and hydrated

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: hydrate is anoun and hydratedaverb. On the page they differ by 1 extra letter(s) - “hydrate” sits inside “hydrated”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 48261, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

hydrate is recorded at frequency rank #27,875, classified as anoun, pronounced /haɪˈdɹeɪt/. hydrated is at rank #20,386, tagged as averb.

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 48261, this pair ranks #194,765 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of hydrate vs hydrated

Shared letters: adehrty. Private to "hydrate": -. Private to "hydrated": -.

"hydrate" · 7 letters · shape CVCCVCV  ·  "hydrated" · 8 letters · shape CVCCVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • hydratehdyrate · hhydrate · hydarte · hyddrate · hydraet · hydratte · hydrrate · hydrtae
  • hydratedhdyrated · hhydrated · hydarted · hyddrated · hydraetd · hydratde · hydratedd · hydratted

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "hydrate" and "hydrated" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "hydrate" is a noun and "hydrated" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "hydrate" vs "hydrated" - which ranks higher?
"hydrated" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #20,386 in our English list, against #27,875 for "hydrate". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Pair "hydrate" vs "hydrated" is on the table, pick a follow-up below.

  • Full dictionary entry for "hydrate" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "hydrated" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #194,765 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "hydrate" and "hydrated" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "hydrant vs hydrate". 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 #194,765 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