holyvshörWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: holy is a adjective, hör is a verb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“holy” is an adjective and “hör” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#14,833
“holy” frequency rank
#2,601
“hör” frequency rank
17434
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature holy hör
Definition heilig 2. Person Singular Imperativ Präsens Aktiv des Verbs hören

Letter map: holy vs hör

Shared letters muted; letters that set holy and hör apart highlighted. Shared run: 1.

4 ch
holy
3 ch
hör

Role in the sentence - holy and hör

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: holy is anadjective and höraverb. On the page they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 17434, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

holy is recorded at frequency rank #14,833, classified as anadj, pronounced […]. hör is at rank #2,601, tagged as averb, pronounced [høːɐ̯].

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 17434, this pair ranks #1,927,441 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of holy vs hör

Shared letters: h. Private to "holy": loy. Private to "hör": .

"holy" · 4 letters · shape CVCV  ·  "hör" · 3 letters · shape CVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • holyhholy · hloy · holyy · hoyl · ohly

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "holy" and "hör" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "holy" is an adjective and "hör" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "holy" or "hör"?
"hör" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #2,601 in our German list, against #14,833 for "holy". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Pair "holy" vs "hör" is on the table, pick a follow-up below.

  • Full dictionary entry for "holy" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "hör" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,927,441 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "holy" and "hör" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "holy vs puzzles". 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 #1,927,441 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