pattenvspittedWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: patten is a noun, pitted is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“patten” is a noun and “pitted” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#33,358
“patten” frequency rank
#23,631
“pitted” frequency rank
56989
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature patten pitted
Definition Any of various types of footwear with thick soles, often used to elevate the foot, especially wooden clogs. Having a surface marked by pits; pockmarked or alveolate.

Letter map: patten vs pitted

Shared letters muted; letters that set patten and pitted apart highlighted. Shared run: 4. patten and pitted follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCCVC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

6 ch
patten
6 ch
pitted

Grammar separator: patten vs pitted

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: patten is anoun and pittedanadjective. On the page they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 56989, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

patten is recorded at frequency rank #33,358, classified as anoun, pronounced /ˈpat(ə)n/. pitted is at rank #23,631, tagged as anadj.

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 56989, this pair ranks #122,349 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of patten vs pitted

Shared letters: ept. Private to "patten": an. Private to "pitted": di.

"patten" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC  ·  "pitted" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • patten ← aptten · paten · pattenn · pattne · ppatten · ptaten
  • pitted ← iptted · pited · pitetd · pittde · pittedd · ppitted · ptited

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "patten" and "pitted" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "patten" is a noun and "pitted" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "patten" or "pitted"?
"pitted" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #23,631 in our English list, against #33,358 for "patten". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Pair "patten" vs "pitted" is on the table, pick a follow-up below.

  • Full dictionary entry for "patten" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "pitted" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #122,349 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "patten" and "pitted" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Paton vs patten". 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 #122,349 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list