parsvspastWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: pars is a noun, past is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“pars” is a noun and “past” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#44,903
“pars” frequency rank
#38,289
“past” frequency rank
83192
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature pars past
Definition Una de las porciones (iguales o no) en las que se pueda dividir una cosa (material o no), parte, porción, trozo, pedazo, pieza, etc. Pasado, que ocurrió en el pasado.

Where the spellings diverge

Shared letters are muted; the letters that actually set pars and past apart are highlighted. They share 3 letters in sequence, which is exactly why the eye skips the difference.

4 ch
pars
4 ch
past

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: pars is /ˈpars/ while past is /pɑːst/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 83192, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

pars is recorded at frequency rank #44,903, classified as anoun, pronounced /ˈpars/. past is at rank #38,289, tagged as anadj, pronounced /pɑːst/.

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 83192, this pair ranks #8,381 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of pars vs past

Shared letters: aps. Private to "pars": r. Private to "past": t.

"pars" · 4 letters · shape CVCC  ·  "past" · 4 letters · shape CVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • parsaprs · parrs · parss · pasr · ppars · pras
  • pastapst · passt · pastt · pats · ppast · psat

Frequency comparison

pars#44,903
past#38,289

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "pars" and "past" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "pars" is a noun and "past" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "pars" or "past"?
"past" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #38,289 in our Spanish list, against #44,903 for "pars". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Remembering pars vs past

The fastest way to pick the right one every time.

  • Check the role first: if you need a noun, it's “pars”; for an adjective, it's “past”.
  • See each word in full, definition, IPA, etymology and its other confusables. Full “pars” entry
  • Browse more pairs most likely to be confused. Most confusable

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list FrequencyWords open word-frequency list