Which to use
“he's” is a contraction and “hes” is a determiner - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #227
- “he's” frequency rank
- #7,568
- “hes” frequency rank
- 7795
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | he's | hes |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Contraction of he + is. | Alternative form of his when pronounced as he's; belonging to him. |
Same sound, different letters: he's vs hes
Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 3 letters.
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
Say them out loud and nothing separates them: he's and hes carry the same recorded pronunciation, /ˈhiːz/. Grammar is what tells them apart: one is acontraction, the other adeterminer, so most sentences will only accept one of them. They differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 7795, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
he's is recorded at frequency rank #227, classified as acontraction, pronounced /ˈhiːz/. hes is at rank #7,568, tagged as adet, pronounced /hiːz/.
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 7795, this pair ranks #505,548 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of he's vs hes
Shared letters: ehs. Private to "he's": -. Private to "hes": -.
"he's" · 3 letters · shape CVC · "hes" · 3 letters · shape CVC