English homophones
deaf/def
"deaf" is an adjective; "def" 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: "deaf" arrives as an adjective, while "def" is a noun. Once the sentence role is fixed, only one spelling fits.
Spelling pairs in this cluster
- Shared stem "de" then splits - "deaf" (4 letters) vs "def" (3).
Orthographic DNA of this cluster
Shared letters across deaf, def: def. Private letters are the ones only one spelling owns: the eye's fastest tell once sound is out of the picture.
deaf
4 letters · 2 vowels · shape CVVC
Inventory adef · private a
def
3 letters · 1 vowels · shape CVC
Inventory def · no private letters vs siblings
Pick the spelling from the meaning
- Write "deaf" when you mean: Unable (or partially able) to hear.
- Write "def" when you mean: Abbreviation of definition.
Known mistypes of these spellings
Edit-distance variants recorded against this cluster: useful when a search or OCR feed lands on the wrong form.
- deaf ← daef · ddeaf · deaff · defa · edaf
Each spelling
Nearby English homophone groups
What to do next
You've reviewed the 2-spelling cluster (deaf, def). Here's where to go from here.
- "deaf" is the most frequent headword in this 2-spelling cluster (rank #7,214 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: days · daze. 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.