shows vs sons, What's the Difference?

Which to use

“shows” is a verb and “sons” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#8,130
“shows” frequency rank: #25,315
“sons” frequency rank: 33445
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature	shows	sons
Definition	3. Person Singular Indikativ Präsens Aktiv des Verbs show	Plural des Substantivs son

Letter map: shows vs sons

Shared letters muted; letters that set shows and sons apart highlighted. Shared run: 3.

5 ch

shows

4 ch

sons

Grammar separator: shows vs sons

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: shows is averb and sonsanoun. On the page they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 33445, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

shows is recorded at frequency rank #8,130, classified as averb, pronounced […]. sons is at rank #25,315, tagged as anoun, pronounced [sʌnz].

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 33445, this pair ranks #1,685,848 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of shows vs sons

Shared letters: os. Private to "shows": hw. Private to "sons": n.

"shows" · 5 letters · shape CCVCC · "sons" · 4 letters · shape CVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

shows ← hsows · shhows · shosw · showss · showws · shwos · sohws · sshows
sons ← osns · snos · sonns · sonss · sosn · ssons

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "shows" and "sons" mean the same thing in a sentence?

No - they are not even the same part of speech. "shows" is a verb and "sons" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.

Frequency check: "shows" vs "sons" - which ranks higher?

"shows" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #8,130 in our German list, against #25,315 for "sons". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Pair "shows" vs "sons" is on the table, pick a follow-up below.

Full dictionary entry for "shows" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
Full dictionary entry for "sons" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
This pair ranks #1,685,848 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
"shows" and "sons" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "sons vs SUVs". 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 #1,685,848 of 2,006,359 scored German pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.