hastevshseConfusable pair

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

Which to use

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

#17,853
“haste” frequency rank
#36,606
“hse” frequency rank
54459
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature haste hse
Definition Speed; swiftness; dispatch. A gender-neutral pronoun.

Letter map: haste vs hse

Shared letters muted; letters that set haste and hse apart highlighted. Shared run: 3. haste runs 5 letters (CVCCV) against hse's 3 (CCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

5 ch
haste
3 ch
hse

Grammar separator: haste vs hse

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: haste is anoun and hseapronoun. On the page they differ by 2 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 54459, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

haste is recorded at frequency rank #17,853, classified as anoun, pronounced /heɪst/. hse is at rank #36,606, tagged as apron.

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 54459, this pair ranks #140,960 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of haste vs hse

Shared letters: ehs. Private to "haste": at. Private to "hse": -.

"haste" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV  ·  "hse" · 3 letters · shape CCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • haste ← ahste · haset · hasste · hastte · hhaste · hsate

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "haste" for "hse" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "haste" is a noun and "hse" a pronoun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary English text, does "haste" or "hse" show up more?
"haste" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #17,853 in our English list, against #36,606 for "hse". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Pair "haste" vs "hse" is on the table, pick a follow-up below.

  • Full dictionary entry for "haste" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "hse" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #140,960 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "haste" and "hse" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "hoke vs hse". 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 #140,960 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