Which to use
“pedophile” and “pedophilia” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #19,658
- “pedophile” frequency rank
- #25,521
- “pedophilia” frequency rank
- 45179
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | pedophile | pedophilia |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | An adult or older adolescent who is sexually attracted to prepubescent children. | Sexual attraction by adults and adolescents to children, specifically prepubescent children. |
Where the eye mixes pedophile and pedophilia
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 8 letters in sequence. pedophile runs 9 letters (CVCVCCVCV) against pedophilia's 10 (CVCVCCVCVV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Visual trap between pedophile and pedophilia
A purely visual mix-up. pedophile (/ˈpiː.dəˌfaɪl/) and pedophilia (/ˌpiː.dəˈfɪ.li.ə/) 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 45179, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
pedophile is recorded at frequency rank #19,658, classified as anoun, pronounced /ˈpiː.dəˌfaɪl/. pedophilia is at rank #25,521, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ˌpiː.dəˈfɪ.li.ə/.
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 45179, this pair ranks #223,662 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of pedophile vs pedophilia
Shared letters: dehilop. Private to "pedophile": -. Private to "pedophilia": a.
"pedophile" · 9 letters · shape CVCVCCVCV · "pedophilia" · 10 letters · shape CVCVCCVCVV
Known mistypes of this pair
- pedophile ← epdophile · pdeophile · peddophile · pedohpile · pedophhile · pedophiel · pedophille · pedophlie
- pedophilia ← epdophilia · pdeophilia · peddophilia · pedohpilia · pedophhilia · pedophiila · pedophilai · pedophillia
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "pedophile" for "pedophilia" ever safe?
Frequency check: "pedophile" vs "pedophilia" - which ranks higher?
What to do next
Eye-level mix-up between "pedophile" and "pedophilia" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.
- Full dictionary entry for "pedophile" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "pedophilia" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #223,662 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "pedophile" and "pedophilia" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "paedophile vs pedophile". 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 #223,662 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.