roostervsrouterTell them apart

Which to use

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

#19,441
“rooster” frequency rank
#15,046
“router” frequency rank
34487
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature rooster router
Definition A male domestic chicken (Gallus gallus domesticus) or other gallinaceous bird. Someone who routes or directs items from one location to another.

Where the eye mixes rooster and router

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

7 ch
rooster
6 ch
router

Look-alike desk: rooster vs router

A purely visual mix-up. rooster (/ˈɹuːstə/) and router (/ˈɹuː.tə(ɹ)/) 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 34487, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

rooster is recorded at frequency rank #19,441, classified as anoun, pronounced /ˈɹuːstə/. router is at rank #15,046, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ˈɹuː.tə(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 34487, this pair ranks #320,352 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of rooster vs router

Shared letters: eort. Private to "rooster": s. Private to "router": u.

"rooster" · 7 letters · shape CVVCCVC  ·  "router" · 6 letters · shape CVVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • roosteroroster · roosetr · roosster · roosterr · roostre · roostter · rootser · rosoter
  • routeroruter · rotuer · rouetr · routerr · routre · routter · rrouter · ruoter

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "rooster" and "router" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (/ˈɹuːstə/ versus /ˈɹuː.tə(ɹ)/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "rooster" or "router"?
"router" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #15,046 in our English list, against #19,441 for "rooster". 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 "rooster" and "router" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "rooster" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "router" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #320,352 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "rooster" and "router" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "raster vs rooster". 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 #320,352 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