cabvscasWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#22,504
“cab” frequency rank
#157
“cas” frequency rank
22661
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature cab cas
Definition Taxi britannique. Accident, aventure, conjoncture, occasion ; fait arrivé, ou qui peut arriver.

Where the eye mixes cab and cas

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

3 ch
cab
3 ch
cas

Why the eye confuses cab with cas

A purely visual mix-up. cab (\kab\) and cas (\kɑ\) 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 “cab” becomes s in “cas”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 22661, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

cab is recorded at frequency rank #22,504, classified as anoun, pronounced \kab\. cas is at rank #157, tagged as anoun, pronounced \kɑ\.

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 22661, this pair ranks #356,783 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of cab vs cas

Shared letters: ac. Private to "cab": b. Private to "cas": s.

"cab" · 3 letters · shape CVC  ·  "cas" · 3 letters · shape CVC

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "cab" and "cas" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\kab\ versus \kɑ\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "cab" or "cas"?
"cas" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #157 in our French list, against #22,504 for "cab". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

After this comparison

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "cab" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "cas" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #356,783 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "cab" and "cas" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "cab vs CCE". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #356,783 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