Which to use
“hares” and “haven” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #37,482
- “hares” frequency rank
- #5,797
- “haven” frequency rank
- 43279
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | hares | haven |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | plural of hare | A harbour or anchorage protected from the sea. |
Where the eye mixes hares and haven
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. hares and haven follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCVC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.
Visual trap between hares and haven
A purely visual mix-up. hares (/hɛɚz/) and haven (/ˈheɪvən/) 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 43279, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
hares is recorded at frequency rank #37,482, classified as anoun, pronounced /hɛɚz/. haven is at rank #5,797, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ˈheɪvən/.
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 43279, this pair ranks #241,529 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of hares vs haven
Shared letters: aeh. Private to "hares": rs. Private to "haven": nv.
"hares" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC · "haven" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "hares" and "haven" mean the same thing in a sentence?
In ordinary English text, does "hares" or "haven" show up more?
After this comparison
Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.
- Full dictionary entry for "hares" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "haven" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #241,529 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "hares" and "haven" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "hares vs Hoare". 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 #241,529 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.