Which to use
“paste” and “pastime” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #8,183
- “paste” frequency rank
- #25,516
- “pastime” frequency rank
- 33699
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | paste | pastime |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | A soft moist mixture, in particular: | Something which amuses, and serves to make time pass agreeably. |
Where the eye mixes paste and pastime
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence.
Look-alike desk: paste vs pastime
A purely visual mix-up. paste (/peɪst/) and pastime (/ˈpæs.taɪm/) 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 33699, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
paste is recorded at frequency rank #8,183, classified as anoun, pronounced /peɪst/. pastime is at rank #25,516, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ˈpæs.taɪm/.
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 33699, this pair ranks #327,143 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of paste vs pastime
Shared letters: aepst. Private to "paste": -. Private to "pastime": im.
"paste" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV · "pastime" · 7 letters · shape CVCCVCV
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "paste" and "pastime" mean the same thing in a sentence?
Which is more common, "paste" or "pastime"?
What to do next
Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.
- Full dictionary entry for "paste" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "pastime" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #327,143 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "paste" and "pastime" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "pastime vs pasting". 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 #327,143 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.