textvstextsWhat's the difference?

Which to use

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

#1,062
“text” frequency rank
#4,053
“texts” frequency rank
5115
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature text texts
Definition A writing consisting of multiple glyphs, characters, symbols or sentences. plural of text

Where the eye mixes text and texts

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence.

4 ch
text
5 ch
texts

Why the eye confuses text with texts

A purely visual mix-up. text (/tɛkst/) and texts (/tɛksts/) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 1 extra letter(s) - “text” sits inside “texts”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 5115, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

text is recorded at frequency rank #1,062, classified as anoun, pronounced /tɛkst/. texts is at rank #4,053, tagged as anoun, pronounced /tɛksts/.

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 5115, this pair ranks #516,527 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of text vs texts

Shared letters: etx. Private to "text": -. Private to "texts": s.

"text" · 4 letters · shape CVCC  ·  "texts" · 5 letters · shape CVCCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • textetxt · tetx · textt · texxt · ttext · txet
  • textsetxts · tetxs · texst · textss · textts · texxts · ttexts · txets

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "text" and "texts" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (/tɛkst/ versus /tɛksts/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary English text, does "text" or "texts" show up more?
"text" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #1,062 in our English list, against #4,053 for "texts". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "text" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "texts" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #516,527 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "text" and "texts" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "texts vs tints". 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 #516,527 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