English homophones
their/they're
2 "their, they're" spellings share pronunciation /ðɛə/; meaning alone separates them. Size rank #133 of 1,007 English groups.
Data vintage
Meaning separates the spellings
their, they're are held together only by pronunciation /ðɛə/. With no grammar or frequency gap large enough to tip the choice, read each definition before you commit a spelling.
Spelling pairs in this cluster
- Shared stem "the" then splits - "their" (5 letters) vs "they're" (7).
Orthographic DNA of this cluster
Shared letters across their, they're: ehrt. Private letters are the ones only one spelling owns: the eye's fastest tell once sound is out of the picture.
their
5 letters · 2 vowels · shape CCVVC
Inventory ehirt · private i
they're
6 letters · 3 vowels · shape CCVVCV
Inventory ehrty · private y
Pick the spelling from the meaning
- Write "their" when you mean: Belonging to, from, of, or relating to, them (plural).
- Write "they're" when you mean: Contraction of they + are.
Known mistypes of these spellings
Edit-distance variants recorded against this cluster: useful when a search or OCR feed lands on the wrong form.
- their ← hteir · tehir · theirr · theri · thheir · ttheir
Each spelling
Nearby English homophone groups
What to do next
You've reviewed the 2-spelling cluster (their, they're). Here's where to go from here.
- "their" is the most frequent headword in this 2-spelling cluster (rank #56 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: try · tri. Nearby cluster
- Each spelling in "their, they're" 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.