bugvsButtWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

“bug” and “Butt” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#9,966
“bug” frequency rank
#46,624
“Butt” frequency rank
56590
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature bug Butt
Definition Dysfonctionnement d’un logiciel ou d’un composant informatique. Flet, fléteau Platichthys flesus

Where the eye mixes bug and Butt

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.

3 ch
bug
4 ch
Butt

Why the eye confuses bug with Butt

A purely visual mix-up. bug (\bœɡ\) and Butt (\bʊt\) 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 56590, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

bug is recorded at frequency rank #9,966, classified as anoun, pronounced \bœɡ\. Butt is at rank #46,624, tagged as anoun, pronounced \bʊt\.

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 56590, this pair ranks #120,147 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of bug vs Butt

Shared letters: bu. Private to "bug": g. Private to "Butt": t.

"bug" · 3 letters · shape CVC  ·  "Butt" · 4 letters · shape CVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • Buttbbutt · btut · ubtt

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "bug" for "Butt" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (\bœɡ\ versus \bʊt\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "bug" or "Butt"?
"bug" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #9,966 in our French list, against #46,624 for "Butt". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "bug" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "Butt" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #120,147 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "bug" and "Butt" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "bury vs Butt". 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 #120,147 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list