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What's the difference between a crevice and a crevasse?
Crevice and crevasse are very similar words: both come from Old French crever "to break or burst" and both refer to an opening of some kind. In fact, you can say that the only notable distinction between the two is the size of the openings they denote—and that one of them—crevice—is far more common than the other.
A crevice is a narrow opening resulting from a split or crack. In nature, crevices exist mostly in rocks and cliffs, but writers sometimes use the word for similar openings found in other materials, as in "crumbs in the crevices of the cushion." The word also is used metaphorically, as in "the cracks and crevices of memory."
Crevasse refers to a deep hole or fissure in a glacier or in the earth. In most instances, the word appears with enough context that the depth of the opening is easy enough to figure out, as in "a climber who fell 30 feet into a crevasse."
You'll sometimes find crevice used where crevasse is expected—probably because it's the word people are more familiar with. One way to remember the distinction between crevice and crevasse is that the i in crevice, the smaller hole, is a thinner letter than a in crevasse, the larger hole. Or, should you step into a crevasse, perhaps you'll have time for a lot of "Ahhhs"?
Examples of crevasse in a Sentence
Rachel Wolf, FOXNews.com, 12 Aug. 2025
The remains of a British researcher who fell into a crevasse on an Antarctic glacier 66 years ago have been recovered, the British Antarctic Survey (BAS) said.
—Haicen Yang, CNN Money, 12 Aug. 2025
Bell died on July 26, 1959 in a crevasse on the glacier at Admiralty Bay on King George Island, off the Antarctic Peninsula, BAS reported in a news release.
—Natalie Neysa Alund, USA Today, 11 Aug. 2025
Niches and crevasses are forming between the hull plates, and those tight spaces hold hidden artifacts, Mazraani says.
—Mark Price
july 29, Miami Herald, 29 July 2025
See All Example Sentences for crevasse
Cite this Entry
“Crevasse.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/crevasse. Accessed 10 Sep. 2025.
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crevasse
noun
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