pittedvsputterConfusable pair

Quick tell: pitted is a adjective, putter is a verb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

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

#23,631
“pitted” frequency rank
#32,547
“putter” frequency rank
56178
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature pitted putter
Definition Having a surface marked by pits; pockmarked or alveolate. To be active, but not excessively busy, at a task or a series of tasks.

Letter map: pitted vs putter

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

6 ch
pitted
6 ch
putter

Grammar separator: pitted vs putter

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: pitted is anadjective and putteraverb. On the page they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 56178, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

pitted is recorded at frequency rank #23,631, classified as anadj. putter is at rank #32,547, tagged as averb, pronounced /ˈpʌtə(ɹ)/.

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 56178, this pair ranks #128,123 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of pitted vs putter

Shared letters: ept. Private to "pitted": di. Private to "putter": ru.

"pitted" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC  ·  "putter" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • pitted ← iptted · pited · pitetd · pittde · pittedd · ppitted · ptited
  • putter ← pputter · ptuter · puter · putetr · putterr · puttre · uptter

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "pitted" and "putter" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "pitted" is an adjective and "putter" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "pitted" vs "putter" - which ranks higher?
"pitted" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #23,631 in our English list, against #32,547 for "putter". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

You've compared "pitted" and "putter". Here's where to go from here.

  • Full dictionary entry for "pitted" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "putter" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #128,123 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "pitted" and "putter" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "pester vs putter". 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 #128,123 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