thankedvsthawedConfusable pair

Which to use

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

#12,341
“thanked” frequency rank
#41,422
“thawed” frequency rank
53763
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature thanked thawed
Definition simple past and past participle of thank simple past and past participle of thaw

Where the eye mixes thanked and thawed

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence.

7 ch
thanked
6 ch
thawed

Visual trap between thanked and thawed

A purely visual mix-up. thanked (/θæŋkt/) and thawed (/θɔːd/) 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 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 53763, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

thanked is recorded at frequency rank #12,341, classified as averb, pronounced /θæŋkt/. thawed is at rank #41,422, tagged as averb, pronounced /θɔːd/.

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 53763, this pair ranks #146,404 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of thanked vs thawed

Shared letters: adeht. Private to "thanked": kn. Private to "thawed": w.

"thanked" · 7 letters · shape CCVCCVC  ·  "thawed" · 6 letters · shape CCVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • thankedhtanked · tahnked · thakned · thanekd · thankde · thankedd · thankked · thannked
  • thawedhtawed · tahwed · thaewd · thawde · thawedd · thawwed · thhawed · thwaed

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "thanked" and "thawed" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (/θæŋkt/ versus /θɔːd/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "thanked" vs "thawed" - which ranks higher?
"thanked" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #12,341 in our English list, against #41,422 for "thawed". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Eye-level mix-up between "thanked" and "thawed" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "thanked" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "thawed" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #146,404 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "thanked" and "thawed" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "teared vs thawed". 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 #146,404 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