haovsheWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: hao is a noun, he is a pronoun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“hao” is a noun and “he” is a pronoun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#31,588
“hao” frequency rank
#22
“he” frequency rank
31610
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature hao he
Definition A former currency unit of Vietnam, worth one tenth of a dong. A person who identifies as male, or animal already known or implied.

Letter map: hao vs he

Shared letters muted; letters that set hao and he apart highlighted. Shared run: 1.

3 ch
hao
2 ch
he

Grammar separator: hao vs he

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: hao is anoun and heapronoun. On the page they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 31610, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

hao is recorded at frequency rank #31,588, classified as anoun. he is at rank #22, tagged as apron, pronounced /ˈhiː/.

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 31610, this pair ranks #344,706 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of hao vs he

Shared letters: h. Private to "hao": ao. Private to "he": e.

"hao" · 3 letters · shape CVV  ·  "he" · 2 letters · shape CV

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "hao" for "he" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "hao" is a noun and "he" a pronoun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "hao" or "he"?
"he" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #22 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.

What to do next

Pair "hao" vs "he" is on the table, pick a follow-up below.

  • Full dictionary entry for "hao" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "he" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #344,706 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "hao" and "he" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "hao vs HRW". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #344,706 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