shopsvstheirWhat's the difference?

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

Which to use

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

#11,970
“shops” frequency rank
#11,131
“their” frequency rank
23101
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature shops their
Definition Plural des Substantivs shop ihr

Where the spellings diverge

Shared letters are muted; the letters that actually set shops and their apart are highlighted. They share 1 letter in sequence, which is exactly why the eye skips the difference.

5 ch
shops
5 ch
their

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: shops is anoun and theirapronoun. On the page they share most of their letters but differ in 4 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 23101, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

shops is recorded at frequency rank #11,970, classified as anoun, 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 23101, this pair ranks #1,865,776 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of shops vs their

Shared letters: h. Private to "shops": ops. Private to "their": eirt.

"shops" · 5 letters · shape CCVCC  ·  "their" · 5 letters · shape CCVVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • shopshsops · shhops · shopps · shopss · shosp · shpos · sohps · sshops
  • theirhteir · tehir · theirr · theri · thheir · thier · ttheir

Frequency comparison

shops#11,970
their#11,131

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "shops" and "their" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "shops" is a noun and "their" a pronoun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "shops" or "their"?
"their" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #11,131 in our German list, against #11,970 for "shops". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Remembering shops vs their

The fastest way to pick the right one every time.

  • Check the role first: if you need a noun, it's “shops”; for a pronoun, it's “their”.
  • See each word in full, definition, IPA, etymology and its other confusables. Full “shops” entry
  • Browse more pairs most likely to be confused. Most confusable

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list