Which to use
“pate” and “pease” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #33,784
- “pate” frequency rank
- #37,149
- “pease” frequency rank
- 70933
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | pate | pease |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | The head, particularly the top or crown. | Alternative form of pea (“common plant; its edible seed”). |
Where the eye mixes pate and pease
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. pate runs 4 letters (CVCV) against pease's 5 (CVVCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Look-alike desk: pate vs pease
A purely visual mix-up. pate (/peɪt/) and pease (/piːz/) 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 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 70933, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
pate is recorded at frequency rank #33,784, classified as anoun, pronounced /peɪt/. pease is at rank #37,149, tagged as anoun, pronounced /piːz/.
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 70933, this pair ranks #48,670 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of pate vs pease
Shared letters: aep. Private to "pate": t. Private to "pease": s.
"pate" · 4 letters · shape CVCV · "pease" · 5 letters · shape CVVCV
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Can "pate" and "pease" be used interchangeably?
Which is more common, "pate" or "pease"?
What to do next
Eye-level mix-up between "pate" and "pease" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.
- Full dictionary entry for "pate" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "pease" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #48,670 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "pate" and "pease" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "pease vs pecs". 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 #48,670 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.