margevsMcRaeConfusable pair

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

Which to use

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

#26,155
“marge” frequency rank
#41,759
“McRae” frequency rank
67914
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature marge McRae
Definition Margin; edge; brink or verge. A surname from Scottish Gaelic.

Letter map: marge vs McRae

Shared letters muted; letters that set marge and McRae apart highlighted. Shared run: 3. marge (CVCCV) and McRae (CCCVV) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.

5 ch
marge
5 ch
McRae

Role in the sentence - marge and McRae

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: marge is anoun and McRaeaname. On the page they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 67914, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

marge is recorded at frequency rank #26,155, classified as anoun, pronounced /mɑɹd͡ʒ/. McRae is at rank #41,759, tagged as aname.

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 67914, this pair ranks #61,235 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of marge vs McRae

Shared letters: aemr. Private to "marge": g. Private to "McRae": c.

"marge" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV  ·  "McRae" · 5 letters · shape CCCVV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • marge ← amrge · magre · mareg · margge · marrge · mmarge · mrage
  • McRae ← cmrae · mcare · mccrae · mcrea · mcrrae · mmcrae · mrcae

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "marge" for "McRae" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "marge" is a noun and "McRae" a name, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "marge" or "McRae"?
"marge" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #26,155 in our English list, against #41,759 for "McRae". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Pair "marge" vs "McRae" is on the table, pick a follow-up below.

  • Full dictionary entry for "marge" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "McRae" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #61,235 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "marge" and "McRae" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Marne vs McRae". 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 #61,235 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