Which to use
“sticky” is an adjective and “stinks” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #9,673
- “sticky” frequency rank
- #22,827
- “stinks” frequency rank
- 32500
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | sticky | stinks |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Tending to stick; able to adhere via the drying of a viscous substance. | Chemistry (as a subject taught in school). |
Letter map: sticky vs stinks
Shared letters muted; letters that set sticky and stinks apart highlighted. Shared run: 4. sticky (CCVCCV) and stinks (CCVCCC) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.
Part-of-speech tell for sticky / stinks
Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: sticky is anadjective and stinksanoun. On the page they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 32500, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
sticky is recorded at frequency rank #9,673, classified as anadj, pronounced /ˈstɪki/. stinks is at rank #22,827, tagged as anoun.
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 32500, this pair ranks #337,292 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of sticky vs stinks
Shared letters: ikst. Private to "sticky": cy. Private to "stinks": n.
"sticky" · 6 letters · shape CCVCCV · "stinks" · 6 letters · shape CCVCCC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Can "sticky" and "stinks" be used interchangeably?
In ordinary English text, does "sticky" or "stinks" show up more?
What to do next
Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "sticky" and "stinks".
- Full dictionary entry for "sticky" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "stinks" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #337,292 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "sticky" and "stinks" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "slinky vs stinks". 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 #337,292 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.