themvstieWhich spelling fits?

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

Which to use

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

#15,759
“them” frequency rank
#29,817
“tie” frequency rank
45576
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature them tie
Definition Personalpronomen 3. Person Plural Objektform: ihnen, sie nichts sagen; schweigen

Letter map: them vs tie

Shared letters muted; letters that set them and tie apart highlighted. Shared run: 2.

4 ch
them
3 ch
tie

Part-of-speech tell for them / tie

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: them is apronoun and tieaverb. On the page they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 45576, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

them is recorded at frequency rank #15,759, classified as apron, pronounced [ðɛm]. tie is at rank #29,817, tagged as averb, 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 45576, this pair ranks #1,348,370 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of them vs tie

Shared letters: et. Private to "them": hm. Private to "tie": i.

"them" · 4 letters · shape CCVC  ·  "tie" · 3 letters · shape CVV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • themhtem · tehm · themm · thhem · thme · tthem

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "them" and "tie" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "them" is a pronoun and "tie" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "them" vs "tie" - which ranks higher?
"them" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #15,759 in our German list, against #29,817 for "tie". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "them" and "tie".

  • Full dictionary entry for "them" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "tie" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #1,348,370 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "them" and "tie" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "puzzles vs tie". 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 #1,348,370 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