Which to use
“hand” and “head” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #375
- “hand” frequency rank
- #288
- “head” frequency rank
- 663
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | hand | head |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | The part of the forelimb below the forearm or wrist in a human, and the corresponding part in many other animals. | The part of the body of an animal or human which contains the brain, mouth, and main sense organs. |
Where the eye mixes hand and head
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
A purely visual mix-up. hand (/ˈhænd/) and head (/ˈhɛd/) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 663, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
hand is recorded at frequency rank #375, classified as anoun, pronounced /ˈhænd/. head is at rank #288, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ˈhɛd/.
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 663, this pair ranks #529,025 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of hand vs head
Shared letters: adh. Private to "hand": n. Private to "head": e.
"hand" · 4 letters · shape CVCC · "head" · 4 letters · shape CVVC