Which to use
“tobe” and “toke” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #49,100
- “tobe” frequency rank
- #40,056
- “toke” frequency rank
- 89156
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | tobe | toke |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | A cotton garment worn in parts of northern Africa. | A gratuity. |
Where the eye mixes tobe and toke
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. tobe and toke follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCV). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.
Look-alike desk: tobe vs toke
A purely visual mix-up. tobe (/təʊb/) and toke (/təʊk/) 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 a single letter - b in “tobe” becomes k in “toke”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 89156, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
tobe is recorded at frequency rank #49,100, classified as anoun, pronounced /təʊb/. toke is at rank #40,056, tagged as anoun, pronounced /təʊk/.
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 89156, this pair ranks #5,512 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of tobe vs toke
Shared letters: eot. Private to "tobe": b. Private to "toke": k.
"tobe" · 4 letters · shape CVCV · "toke" · 4 letters · shape CVCV
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "tobe" for "toke" ever safe?
Which is more common, "tobe" or "toke"?
After this comparison
Eye-level mix-up between "tobe" and "toke" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.
- Full dictionary entry for "tobe" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "toke" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #5,512 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "tobe" and "toke" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "tobe vs Toth". 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 #5,512 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.