PosnervspostedWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: Posner is a name, posted is a verb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“Posner” is a name and “posted” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#35,463
“Posner” frequency rank
#1,146
“posted” frequency rank
36609
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature Posner posted
Definition A surname from German. simple past and past participle of post

Where the eye mixes Posner and posted

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence.

6 ch
Posner
6 ch
posted

Visual trap between Posner and posted

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: Posner is /ˈpoʊz.nəɹ/ while posted is /ˈpoʊstɪd/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (name vs verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 36609, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

Posner is recorded at frequency rank #35,463, classified as aname, pronounced /ˈpoʊz.nəɹ/. 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 36609, this pair ranks #301,734 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of Posner vs posted

Shared letters: eops. Private to "Posner": nr. Private to "posted": dt.

"Posner" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC  ·  "posted" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • Posneropsner · ponser · posenr · posnerr · posnner · posnre · possner · pposner
  • postedopsted · posetd · possted · postde · postedd · postted · potsed · pposted

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "Posner" for "posted" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "Posner" is a name and "posted" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "Posner" vs "posted" - which ranks higher?
"posted" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #1,146 in our English list, against #35,463 for "Posner". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Useful next steps

Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.

  • Full dictionary entry for "Posner" 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 #301,734 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "Posner" and "posted" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "pooper vs Posner". 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 #301,734 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