stadevsstaidWhich spelling fits?

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

Which to use

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

#41,387
“stade” frequency rank
#48,507
“staid” frequency rank
89894
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature stade staid
Definition Synonym of stadion (“former Greek unit of distance”). Not capricious or impulsive; sedate, serious, sober.

Same sound, different letters: stade vs staid

Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 4 letters. stade (CCVCV) and staid (CCVVC) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.

5 ch
stade
5 ch
staid

Same sound, different spelling - stade / staid

Say them out loud and nothing separates them: stade and staid carry the same recorded pronunciation, /steɪd/. Grammar is what tells them apart: one is anoun, the other anadjective, so most sentences will only accept one of them. They share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 89894, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

stade is recorded at frequency rank #41,387, classified as anoun, pronounced /steɪd/. staid is at rank #48,507, tagged as anadj, pronounced /steɪd/.

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 89894, this pair ranks #4,684 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of stade vs staid

Shared letters: adst. Private to "stade": e. Private to "staid": i.

"stade" · 5 letters · shape CCVCV  ·  "staid" · 5 letters · shape CCVVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • stade ← satde · sstade · stadde · stdae · sttade · tsade
  • staid ← satid · sstaid · stadi · staidd · stiad · sttaid · tsaid

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "stade" and "staid" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "stade" is a noun and "staid" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "stade" vs "staid" - which ranks higher?
"stade" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #41,387 in our English list, against #48,507 for "staid". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

You've separated the homophone pair "stade" / "staid". Follow the links when you need the full entry or a neighbour that trips the same ear.

  • Full dictionary entry for "stade" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "staid" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #4,684 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "stade" and "staid" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Sajid vs staid". 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 #4,684 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