Which to use
“he'd” is a contraction and “heads” is an intj - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #2,627
- “he'd” frequency rank
- #2,159
- “heads” frequency rank
- 4786
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | he'd | heads |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Contraction of he + had. | A shouted warning that something is falling from above, mind your heads; heads-up. |
Where the eye mixes he'd and heads
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: he'd is /hiːd/ while heads is /hɛdz/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (contraction vs intj), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 4786, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
he'd is recorded at frequency rank #2,627, classified as acontraction, pronounced /hiːd/. heads is at rank #2,159, tagged as anintj, pronounced /hɛdz/.
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 4786, this pair ranks #517,678 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of he'd vs heads
Shared letters: deh. Private to "he'd": -. Private to "heads": as.
"he'd" · 3 letters · shape CVC · "heads" · 5 letters · shape CVVCC
Known mistypes of this pair
- heads ← ehads · haeds · headds · headss · heasd · hedas · hheads