puzzlesvstheirWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: puzzles is a verb, their is a pronoun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“puzzles” is a verb and “their” is a pronoun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#49,986
“puzzles” frequency rank
#11,131
“their” frequency rank
61117
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature puzzles their
Definition 3. Person Singular Indikativ Präsens Aktiv des Verbs puzzle ihr

Letter map: puzzles vs their

Shared letters muted; letters that set puzzles and their apart highlighted. Shared run: 1. puzzles runs 7 letters (CVCCCVC) against their's 5 (CCVVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

7 ch
puzzles
5 ch
their

Role in the sentence - puzzles and their

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: puzzles is averb and theirapronoun. On the page they differ by 2 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 61117, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

puzzles is recorded at frequency rank #49,986, classified as averb, pronounced […]. their is at rank #11,131, 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 61117, this pair ranks #761,677 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of puzzles vs their

Shared letters: e. Private to "puzzles": lpsuz. Private to "their": hirt.

"puzzles" · 7 letters · shape CVCCCVC  ·  "their" · 5 letters · shape CCVVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • puzzles ← ppuzzles · puzles · puzlzes · puzzels · puzzless · puzzlles · puzzlse · pzuzles
  • their ← hteir · tehir · theirr · theri · thheir · thier · ttheir

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "puzzles" and "their" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "puzzles" is a verb and "their" a pronoun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "puzzles" or "their"?
"their" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #11,131 in our German list, against #49,986 for "puzzles". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "puzzles" and "their".

  • Full dictionary entry for "puzzles" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "their" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #761,677 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "puzzles" and "their" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "purpose 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 #761,677 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