shadervsshakesTell them apart

Which to use

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

#47,901
“shader” frequency rank
#12,139
“shakes” frequency rank
60040
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature shader shakes
Definition One who, or that which, shades. plural of shake

Where the eye mixes shader and shakes

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. shader and shakes follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CCVCVC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

6 ch
shader
6 ch
shakes

Visual trap between shader and shakes

A purely visual mix-up. shader (/ˈʃeɪdɚ/) and shakes (/ʃeɪks/) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 60040, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

shader is recorded at frequency rank #47,901, classified as anoun, pronounced /ˈʃeɪdɚ/. shakes is at rank #12,139, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ʃeɪks/.

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 60040, this pair ranks #102,561 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of shader vs shakes

Shared letters: aehs. Private to "shader": dr. Private to "shakes": k.

"shader" · 6 letters · shape CCVCVC  ·  "shakes" · 6 letters · shape CCVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • shader ← hsader · sahder · shadder · shaderr · shadre · shaedr · shdaer · shhader
  • shakes ← hsakes · sahkes · shaeks · shakess · shakkes · shakse · shhakes · shkaes

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "shader" for "shakes" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (/ˈʃeɪdɚ/ versus /ʃeɪks/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "shader" or "shakes"?
"shakes" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #12,139 in our English list, against #47,901 for "shader". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "shader" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "shakes" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #102,561 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "shader" and "shakes" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Seager vs shader". 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 #102,561 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