English homophones
tails/tales
"tales" (#6,104 written frequency) beats "tails" (#11,622) in this 2-word /teɪlz/ cluster. Size rank #133 of 1,007 English groups.
Data vintage
Frequency splits the cluster
These 2 spellings keep the same /teɪlz/ reading, but written frequency splits them hard: "tales" leads at #6,104, with "tails" trailing at #11,622.
Spelling pairs in this cluster
- Shared stem "ta" then splits - "tails" (5 letters) vs "tales" (5).
Orthographic DNA of this cluster
Shared letters across tails, tales: alst. Private letters are the ones only one spelling owns: the eye's fastest tell once sound is out of the picture.
tails
5 letters · 2 vowels · shape CVVCC
Inventory ailst · private i
tales
5 letters · 2 vowels · shape CVCVC
Inventory aelst · private e
Pick the spelling from the meaning
- Write "tails" when you mean: plural of tail
- Write "tales" when you mean: plural of tale
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 (tails, tales). Here's where to go from here.
- "tales" is the most frequent headword in this 2-spelling cluster (rank #6,104 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: their · they're. Nearby cluster
- Each spelling in "tails, tales" 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.