racyvsrasConfusable pair

Quick tell: racy is a adjective, ras is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

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

#36,304
“racy” frequency rank
#22,193
“ras” frequency rank
58497
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature racy ras
Definition Mildly risqué. An Ethiopian king or prince.

Letter map: racy vs ras

Shared letters muted; letters that set racy and ras apart highlighted. Shared run: 2.

4 ch
racy
3 ch
ras

Part-of-speech tell for racy / ras

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: racy is anadjective and rasanoun. On the page they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 58497, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

racy is recorded at frequency rank #36,304, classified as anadj, pronounced /ˈɹeɪsi/. ras is at rank #22,193, tagged as anoun.

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 58497, this pair ranks #112,160 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of racy vs ras

Shared letters: ar. Private to "racy": cy. Private to "ras": s.

"racy" · 4 letters · shape CVCV  ·  "ras" · 3 letters · shape CVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • racyarcy · raccy · racyy · rayc · rracy

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "racy" and "ras" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "racy" is an adjective and "ras" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "racy" vs "ras" - which ranks higher?
"ras" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #22,193 in our English list, against #36,304 for "racy". 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 "racy" and "ras". Here's where to go from here.

  • Full dictionary entry for "racy" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "ras" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #112,160 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "racy" and "ras" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "racy vs Rapp". 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 #112,160 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