posedvspostedConfusable pair

Which to use

“posed” and “posted” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#9,510
“posed” frequency rank
#1,146
“posted” frequency rank
10656
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature posed posted
Definition simple past and past participle of pose simple past and past participle of post

Where the eye mixes posed and posted

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence.

5 ch
posed
6 ch
posted

Look-alike desk: posed vs posted

A purely visual mix-up. posed (/pəʊzd/) and posted (/ˈpoʊstɪd/) 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 10656, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

posed is recorded at frequency rank #9,510, classified as averb, pronounced /pəʊzd/. posted is at rank #1,146, tagged as averb, pronounced /ˈpoʊstɪd/.

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 10656, this pair ranks #491,211 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of posed vs posted

Shared letters: deops. Private to "posed": -. Private to "posted": t.

"posed" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC  ·  "posted" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • posedopsed · poesd · posde · posedd · possed · pposed · psoed
  • postedopsted · posetd · possted · postde · postedd · postted · potsed · pposted

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "posed" and "posted" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (/pəʊzd/ versus /ˈpoʊstɪd/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "posed" or "posted"?
"posted" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #1,146 in our English list, against #9,510 for "posed". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Eye-level mix-up between "posed" and "posted" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "posed" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "posted" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #491,211 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "posed" and "posted" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "plied vs posed". 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 #491,211 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