Which to use
“pasty” is an adjective and “pate” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #33,783
- “pasty” frequency rank
- #33,784
- “pate” frequency rank
- 67567
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | pasty | pate |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Like paste, sticky. | The head, particularly the top or crown. |
Where the eye mixes pasty and pate
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. pasty runs 5 letters (CVCCV) against pate's 4 (CVCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Visual trap between pasty and pate
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: pasty is /ˈpeɪsti/ while pate is /peɪt/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (adjective vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 67567, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
pasty is recorded at frequency rank #33,783, classified as anadj, pronounced /ˈpeɪsti/. pate is at rank #33,784, tagged as anoun, pronounced /peɪt/.
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 67567, this pair ranks #62,745 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of pasty vs pate
Shared letters: apt. Private to "pasty": sy. Private to "pate": e.
"pasty" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV · "pate" · 4 letters · shape CVCV
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "pasty" for "pate" ever safe?
Frequency check: "pasty" vs "pate" - which ranks higher?
What to do next
Eye-level mix-up between "pasty" and "pate" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.
- Full dictionary entry for "pasty" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "pate" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #62,745 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "pasty" and "pate" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "pappy vs pasty". 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 #62,745 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.