English homophones
loos/lose
"loos" is a noun; "lose" is a verb - grammar picks the spelling, not sound. Size rank #133 of 1,007 English groups.
Data vintage
Grammar picks the spelling
Same sound, different grammar: "loos" arrives as a noun, while "lose" is a verb. Once the sentence role is fixed, only one spelling fits.
Spelling pairs in this cluster
- Shared stem "lo" then splits - "loos" (4 letters) vs "lose" (4).
Orthographic DNA of this cluster
Shared letters across loos, lose: los. Private letters are the ones only one spelling owns: the eye's fastest tell once sound is out of the picture.
loos
4 letters · 2 vowels · shape CVVC
Inventory los · no private letters vs siblings
lose
4 letters · 2 vowels · shape CVCV
Inventory elos · private e
Pick the spelling from the meaning
- Write "loos" when you mean: plural of loo
- Write "lose" when you mean: To cease to have (something) in one's possession or capability.
Known mistypes of these spellings
Edit-distance variants recorded against this cluster: useful when a search or OCR feed lands on the wrong form.
Each spelling
Nearby English homophone groups
What to do next
You've reviewed the 2-spelling cluster (loos, lose). Here's where to go from here.
- "lose" is the most frequent headword in this 2-spelling cluster (rank #879 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: lowry · lorry. 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.