handvshaoTell them apart

Which to use

“hand” and “hao” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#375
“hand” frequency rank
#31,588
“hao” frequency rank
31963
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature hand hao
Definition The part of the forelimb below the forearm or wrist in a human, and the corresponding part in many other animals. A former currency unit of Vietnam, worth one tenth of a dong.

Letter map: hand vs hao

Shared letters muted; letters that set hand and hao apart highlighted. Shared run: 2.

4 ch
hand
3 ch
hao

Spelling & dictionary notes on hand vs hao

hand and hao are indexed as a confusable English pair. We have no recorded pronunciation or part of speech for both members, so the spelling overlap is what we can show you: they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 31963, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

hand is recorded at frequency rank #375, classified as anoun, pronounced /ˈhænd/. hao is at rank #31,588, tagged as anoun.

Glosses for this pair are partially populated in our dataset, but the full side-by-side definitions above should still guide you to the right choice.

With a confusion score of 31963, this pair ranks #341,718 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of hand vs hao

Shared letters: ah. Private to "hand": dn. Private to "hao": o.

"hand" · 4 letters · shape CVCC  ·  "hao" · 3 letters · shape CVV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • handahnd · hadn · handd · hannd · hhand · hnad

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "hand" and "hao" be used interchangeably?
No. They differ by 1 letter(s) in length, but the dictionary glosses above give them different meanings, so swapping one for the other changes what the sentence says.
Frequency check: "hand" vs "hao" - which ranks higher?
"hand" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #375 in our English list, against #31,588 for "hao". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

After this comparison

You've compared "hand" and "hao". Here's where to go from here.

  • Full dictionary entry for "hand" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "hao" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #341,718 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "hand" and "hao" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "hao vs HRW". Nearby pair
  • Recorded mistypes exist for at least one side of this pair, useful when a spell-checker or OCR lands on the wrong form. See mistypes

Confusion rank #341,718 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list