raftingvsrakingConfusable pair

Quick tell: rafting is a verb, raking is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

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

#35,903
“rafting” frequency rank
#30,932
“raking” frequency rank
66835
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature rafting raking
Definition present participle and gerund of raft Swiftly moving.

Letter map: rafting vs raking

Shared letters muted; letters that set rafting and raking apart highlighted. Shared run: 5. rafting runs 7 letters (CVCCVCC) against raking's 6 (CVCVCC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

7 ch
rafting
6 ch
raking

Grammar separator: rafting vs raking

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: rafting is averb and rakinganadjective. On the page they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 66835, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

rafting is recorded at frequency rank #35,903, classified as averb, pronounced /ˈɹɑːftɪŋ/. raking is at rank #30,932, tagged as anadj.

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 66835, this pair ranks #66,189 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of rafting vs raking

Shared letters: aginr. Private to "rafting": ft. Private to "raking": k.

"rafting" · 7 letters · shape CVCCVCC  ·  "raking" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • rafting ← arfting · raffting · rafitng · raftign · raftingg · raftinng · raftnig · raftting
  • raking ← arking · raikng · rakign · rakingg · rakinng · rakking · raknig · rkaing

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "rafting" for "raking" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "rafting" is a verb and "raking" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary English text, does "rafting" or "raking" show up more?
"raking" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #30,932 in our English list, against #35,903 for "rafting". 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 "rafting" and "raking". Here's where to go from here.

  • Full dictionary entry for "rafting" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "raking" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #66,189 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "rafting" and "raking" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "rafting vs rifling". 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 #66,189 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