Which to use
“parting” and “pasting” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #17,918
- “parting” frequency rank
- #37,147
- “pasting” frequency rank
- 55065
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | parting | pasting |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | The act of parting or dividing; division; separation. | The act of applying paste to something, or affixing something using paste. |
Where the eye mixes parting and pasting
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 6 letters in sequence. parting and pasting follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCCVCC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.
Why the eye confuses parting with pasting
A purely visual mix-up. parting (/ˈpɑɹtɪŋ/) and pasting (/ˈpeɪstɪŋ/) 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 a single letter - r in “parting” becomes s in “pasting”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 55065, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
parting is recorded at frequency rank #17,918, classified as anoun, pronounced /ˈpɑɹtɪŋ/. pasting is at rank #37,147, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ˈpeɪstɪŋ/.
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 55065, this pair ranks #136,401 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of parting vs pasting
Shared letters: aginpt. Private to "parting": r. Private to "pasting": s.
"parting" · 7 letters · shape CVCCVCC · "pasting" · 7 letters · shape CVCCVCC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "parting" and "pasting" mean the same thing in a sentence?
Which is more common, "parting" or "pasting"?
What to do next
Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.
- Full dictionary entry for "parting" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "pasting" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #136,401 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "parting" and "pasting" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "pasting vs porting". 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 #136,401 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.