saltedvssortedWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: salted is a adjective, sorted is a verb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

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

#20,217
“salted” frequency rank
#9,253
“sorted” frequency rank
29470
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature salted sorted
Definition To which salt has been added. simple past and past participle of sort

Letter map: salted vs sorted

Shared letters muted; letters that set salted and sorted apart highlighted. Shared run: 4.

6 ch
salted
6 ch
sorted

Role in the sentence - salted and sorted

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: salted is anadjective and sortedaverb. On the page they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 29470, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

salted is recorded at frequency rank #20,217, classified as anadj. sorted is at rank #9,253, tagged as averb, pronounced /ˈsɔɹtɪd/.

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 29470, this pair ranks #362,723 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of salted vs sorted

Shared letters: dest. Private to "salted": al. Private to "sorted": or.

"salted" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC  ·  "sorted" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • saltedaslted · saletd · sallted · saltde · saltedd · saltted · satled · ssalted
  • sortedosrted · soretd · sorrted · sortde · sortedd · sortted · sotred · sroted

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "salted" for "sorted" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "salted" is an adjective and "sorted" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "salted" vs "sorted" - which ranks higher?
"sorted" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #9,253 in our English list, against #20,217 for "salted". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Pair "salted" vs "sorted" is on the table, pick a follow-up below.

  • Full dictionary entry for "salted" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "sorted" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #362,723 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "salted" and "sorted" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "salted vs stilted". 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 #362,723 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