English homophones
cis/sis
"cis" is an adjective; "sis" is a noun - grammar picks the spelling, not sound. Size rank #133 of 1,007 English groups.
Data vintage
Grammar picks the spelling
Same sound, different grammar: "cis" arrives as an adjective, while "sis" is a noun. Once the sentence role is fixed, only one spelling fits.
Spelling pairs in this cluster
- No shared spelling stem: "cis" is 3 letters, "sis" is 3; only the sound ties them.
Orthographic DNA of this cluster
Shared letters across cis, sis: is. Private letters are the ones only one spelling owns: the eye's fastest tell once sound is out of the picture.
cis
3 letters · 1 vowels · shape CVC
Inventory cis · private c
sis
3 letters · 1 vowels · shape CVC
Inventory is · no private letters vs siblings
Pick the spelling from the meaning
- Write "cis" when you mean: Having two mutations on two genes on the same chromosome of a homologous pair.
- Write "sis" when you mean: Clipping of sister.
Each spelling
Nearby English homophone groups
What to do next
You've reviewed the 2-spelling cluster (cis, sis). Here's where to go from here.
- "sis" is the most frequent headword in this 2-spelling cluster (rank #12,501 in English). Full entry
- Among English homophone groups, a cluster of 2 spellings ranks #133 by size (1,007 groups in this vintage). Corpus statistics
- Explore a nearby 2-spelling cluster: council · counsel. Nearby cluster
- Grammar often disambiguates this cluster, match the meaning to the part of speech before picking a spelling. Pick by meaning
PlainSpell is a reference corpus, not spelling advice. Verify unusual forms in context.