casarvscavarTell them apart

Which to use

“casar” and “cavar” are a confusable Spanish pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#8,771
“casar” frequency rank
#28,673
“cavar” frequency rank
37444
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature casar cavar
Definition Anular. Retirar la tierra para hacer un hoyo o una excavación.

Where the eye mixes casar and cavar

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. casar and cavar follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCVC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

5 ch
casar
5 ch
cavar

Look-alike desk: casar vs cavar

A purely visual mix-up. casar ([kaˈsaɾ]) and cavar ([kaˈβ̞aɾ]) 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 - s in “casar” becomes v in “cavar”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 37444, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

casar is recorded at frequency rank #8,771, classified as averb, pronounced [kaˈsaɾ]. cavar is at rank #28,673, tagged as averb, pronounced [kaˈβ̞aɾ].

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 37444, this pair ranks #175,268 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of casar vs cavar

Shared letters: acr. Private to "casar": s. Private to "cavar": v.

"casar" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC  ·  "cavar" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • casaracsar · caasr · casarr · casra · cassar · ccasar · csaar
  • cavaracvar · caavr · cavarr · cavvar · ccavar · cvaar

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "casar" for "cavar" ever safe?
No. They are said differently ([kaˈsaɾ] versus [kaˈβ̞aɾ]) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "casar" or "cavar"?
"casar" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #8,771 in our Spanish list, against #28,673 for "cavar". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "casar" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "cavar" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #175,268 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "casar" and "cavar" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "cavar vs Cova". 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 #175,268 of 323,831 scored Spanish pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list