squashvssquashedWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: squash is a noun, squashed is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“squash” is a noun and “squashed” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#12,506
“squash” frequency rank
#29,478
“squashed” frequency rank
41984
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature squash squashed
Definition A sport played in a walled court with a soft rubber ball and bats like tennis racquets. squeezed until flattened, or until a pulp

Letter map: squash vs squashed

Shared letters muted; letters that set squash and squashed apart highlighted. Shared run: 6.

6 ch
squash
8 ch
squashed

Part-of-speech tell for squash / squashed

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: squash is anoun and squashedanadjective. On the page they differ by 2 extra letter(s) - “squash” sits inside “squashed”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 41984, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

squash is recorded at frequency rank #12,506, classified as anoun, pronounced /skwɒʃ/. squashed is at rank #29,478, 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 41984, this pair ranks #253,343 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of squash vs squashed

Shared letters: ahqsu. Private to "squash": -. Private to "squashed": de.

"squash" · 6 letters · shape CCVVCC  ·  "squashed" · 8 letters · shape CCVVCCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • squashqsuash · sqaush · sqquash · squahs · squashh · squassh · squsah · ssquash
  • squashedqsuashed · sqaushed · sqquashed · squahsed · squasehd · squashde · squashedd · squashhed

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "squash" for "squashed" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "squash" is a noun and "squashed" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "squash" or "squashed"?
"squash" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #12,506 in our English list, against #29,478 for "squashed". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "squash" and "squashed".

  • Full dictionary entry for "squash" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "squashed" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #253,343 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "squash" and "squashed" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "squall vs squash". 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 #253,343 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