hamvshomWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: ham is a noun, hom is a pronoun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“ham” is a noun and “hom” is a pronoun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#10,294
“ham” frequency rank
#43,252
“hom” frequency rank
53546
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature ham hom
Definition äußerste Hautschicht bei Amphibien und Reptilien; Haut die Leute, irgendwelche Leute

Letter map: ham vs hom

Shared letters muted; letters that set ham and hom apart highlighted. Shared run: 2.

3 ch
ham
3 ch
hom

Role in the sentence - ham and hom

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: ham is anoun and homapronoun. On the page they differ by a single letter - a in “ham” becomes o in “hom”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 53546, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

ham is recorded at frequency rank #10,294, classified as anoun, pronounced [ˈhɑmˀ]. hom is at rank #43,252, tagged as apron, pronounced […].

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 53546, this pair ranks #1,053,707 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of ham vs hom

Shared letters: hm. Private to "ham": a. Private to "hom": o.

"ham" · 3 letters · shape CVC  ·  "hom" · 3 letters · shape CVC

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "ham" and "hom" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "ham" is a noun and "hom" a pronoun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "ham" vs "hom" - which ranks higher?
"ham" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #10,294 in our German list, against #43,252 for "hom". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "ham" and "hom".

  • Full dictionary entry for "ham" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "hom" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,053,707 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "ham" and "hom" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "hom vs puzzles". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #1,053,707 of 2,006,359 scored German pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list