Which to use
“paced” and “poached” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #13,779
- “paced” frequency rank
- #29,421
- “poached” frequency rank
- 43200
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | paced | poached |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | simple past and past participle of pace | simple past and past participle of poach |
Where the eye mixes paced and poached
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence. paced runs 5 letters (CVCVC) against poached's 7 (CVVCCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Look-alike desk: paced vs poached
A purely visual mix-up. paced (/peɪst/) and poached (/pəʊtʃt/) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 2 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 43200, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
paced is recorded at frequency rank #13,779, classified as averb, pronounced /peɪst/. poached is at rank #29,421, tagged as averb, pronounced /pəʊtʃt/.
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 43200, this pair ranks #242,292 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of paced vs poached
Shared letters: acdep. Private to "paced": -. Private to "poached": ho.
"paced" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC · "poached" · 7 letters · shape CVVCCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "paced" for "poached" ever safe?
Frequency check: "paced" vs "poached" - which ranks higher?
Useful next steps
Eye-level mix-up between "paced" and "poached" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.
- Full dictionary entry for "paced" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "poached" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #242,292 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "paced" and "poached" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "poached vs poacher". 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 #242,292 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.