Slates vs state, What's the Difference?

Which to use

“Slates” is a name and “state” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#46,781
“Slates” frequency rank: #163
“state” frequency rank: 46944
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature	Slates	state
Definition	A surname.	A condition; a set of circumstances applying at any given time.

Letter map: Slates vs state

Shared letters muted; letters that set Slates and state apart highlighted. Shared run: 4.

6 ch

Slates

5 ch

state

Role in the sentence - Slates and state

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: Slates is aname and stateanoun. On the page they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 46944, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

Slates is recorded at frequency rank #46,781, classified as aname. state is at rank #163, tagged as anoun, pronounced /steɪt/.

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 46944, this pair ranks #207,043 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of Slates vs state

Shared letters: aest. Private to "Slates": l. Private to "state": -.

"Slates" · 6 letters · shape CCVCVC · "state" · 5 letters · shape CCVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

Slates ← lsates · saltes · slaets · slatess · slatse · slattes · sllates · sltaes
state ← satte · sstate · staet · statte · sttae · sttate · tsate

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "Slates" for "state" ever safe?

No - they are not even the same part of speech. "Slates" is a name and "state" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.

In ordinary English text, does "Slates" or "state" show up more?

"state" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #163 in our English list, against #46,781 for "Slates". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Useful next steps

Pair "Slates" vs "state" is on the table, pick a follow-up below.

Full dictionary entry for "Slates" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
Full dictionary entry for "state" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
This pair ranks #207,043 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
"Slates" and "state" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "sate vs Slates". 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 #207,043 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.