TomévstoneTell them apart

Quick tell: Tomé is a name, tone is a verb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“Tomé” is a name and “tone” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#5,443
“Tomé” frequency rank
#44,488
“tone” frequency rank
49931
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature Tomé tone
Definition Apellido. Primera persona del singular (yo) del presente de subjuntivo de tonar.

Where the eye mixes Tomé and tone

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence. Tomé and tone follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCV). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

4 ch
Tomé
4 ch
tone

Look-alike desk: Tomé vs tone

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: Tomé is [t̪oˈme] while tone is [ˈt̪one]. 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 (name vs verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 49931, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

Tomé is recorded at frequency rank #5,443, classified as aname, pronounced [t̪oˈme]. tone is at rank #44,488, tagged as averb, pronounced [ˈt̪one].

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 49931, this pair ranks #106,056 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of Tomé vs tone

Shared letters: ot. Private to "Tomé": mé. Private to "tone": en.

"Tomé" · 4 letters · shape CVCV  ·  "tone" · 4 letters · shape CVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • tone ← otne · tnoe · toen · tonne · ttone

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "Tomé" for "tone" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "Tomé" is a name and "tone" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary Spanish text, does "Tomé" or "tone" show up more?
"Tomé" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #5,443 in our Spanish list, against #44,488 for "tone". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.

  • Full dictionary entry for "Tomé" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "tone" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #106,056 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "Tomé" and "tone" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "tone vs toys". 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 #106,056 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