English homophones
wares/wears
"wears" (#6,316 written frequency) beats "wares" (#23,152) in this 2-word /wɛəz/ cluster. Size rank #133 of 1,007 English groups.
Data vintage
Frequency splits the cluster
These 2 spellings keep the same /wɛəz/ reading, but written frequency splits them hard: "wears" leads at #6,316, with "wares" trailing at #23,152.
Spelling pairs in this cluster
- No shared spelling stem: "wares" is 5 letters, "wears" is 5; only the sound ties them.
Orthographic DNA of this cluster
Shared letters across wares, wears: aersw. Private letters are the ones only one spelling owns: the eye's fastest tell once sound is out of the picture.
wares
5 letters · 2 vowels · shape CVCVC
Inventory aersw · no private letters vs siblings
wears
5 letters · 2 vowels · shape CVVCC
Inventory aersw · no private letters vs siblings
Pick the spelling from the meaning
- Write "wares" when you mean: plural of ware
- Write "wears" when you mean: plural of wear
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 (wares, wears). Here's where to go from here.
- "wears" is the most frequent headword in this 2-spelling cluster (rank #6,316 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: willie · willy. Nearby cluster
- Each spelling in "wares, wears" 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.