English homophones

Raines/rains/reigns/reins

"rains" (#9,085 written frequency) beats "reigns" (#14,621) in this 4-word /ɹeɪnz/ cluster. Size rank #5 of 1,007 English groups.

Data vintage 2026-09-03

Frequency splits the cluster

These 4 spellings keep the same /ɹeɪnz/ reading, but written frequency splits them hard: "rains" leads at #9,085, with "reigns" trailing at #14,621.

Spelling pairs in this cluster

Shared stem "rain" then splits - "Raines" (6 letters) vs "rains" (5).
No shared spelling stem: "Raines" is 6 letters, "reigns" is 6; only the sound ties them.
No shared spelling stem: "Raines" is 6 letters, "reins" is 5; only the sound ties them.
No shared spelling stem: "rains" is 5 letters, "reigns" is 6; only the sound ties them.
No shared spelling stem: "rains" is 5 letters, "reins" is 5; only the sound ties them.
Shared stem "rei" then splits - "reigns" (6 letters) vs "reins" (5).

Orthographic DNA of this cluster

Shared letters across Raines, rains, reigns, reins: inrs. Private letters are the ones only one spelling owns: the eye's fastest tell once sound is out of the picture.

Raines
6 letters · 3 vowels · shape CVVCVC
Inventory aeinrs · private ae
rains
5 letters · 2 vowels · shape CVVCC
Inventory ainrs · private a
reigns
6 letters · 2 vowels · shape CVVCCC
Inventory eginrs · private eg
reins
5 letters · 2 vowels · shape CVVCC
Inventory einrs · private e

Pick the spelling from the meaning

Write "Raines" when you mean: A type of fine linen once imported from France.
Write "rains" when you mean: plural of rain
Write "reigns" when you mean: plural of reign
Write "reins" when you mean: plural of rein

Known mistypes of these spellings

Edit-distance variants recorded against this cluster: useful when a search or OCR feed lands on the wrong form.

Raines ← arines · raiens · rainess · rainnes · rainse · ranies
rains ← arins · rainns · rainss · raisn · ranis · rians
reigns ← erigns · regins · reiggns · reignns · reignss · reigsn
reins ← erins · reinns · reinss · renis · riens · rreins

Each spelling

Raines

noun · /ɹeɪnz/ · #40,864 frequency

A type of fine linen once imported from France.

rains

noun · /ɹeɪnz/ · #9,085 frequency

plural of rain

reigns

noun · /ɹeɪnz/ · #14,621 frequency

plural of reign

reins

noun · /ɹeɪnz/ · #19,436 frequency

plural of rein

Nearby English homophone groups

What to do next

You've reviewed the 4-spelling cluster (Raines, rains, reigns, reins). Here's where to go from here.

"rains" is the most frequent headword in this 4-spelling cluster (rank #9,085 in English). Full entry
Among English homophone groups, a cluster of 4 spellings ranks #5 by size (1,007 groups in this vintage). Corpus statistics
Explore a nearby 4-spelling cluster: row · roe · Rowe · rho. Nearby cluster
Each spelling in "Raines, rains, reigns, reins" has its own headword page with definition, IPA, and misspelling variants. First entry

PlainSpell is a reference corpus, not spelling advice. Verify unusual forms in context.