Which to use
“he's” is a contraction and “his” is a determiner - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #227
- “he's” frequency rank
- #34
- “his” frequency rank
- 261
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | he's | his |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Contraction of he + is. | Belonging to him. |
Where the eye mixes he's and his
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: he's is /ˈhiːz/ while his is /ɪ̈z/. 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 determiner), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 261, 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/. his is at rank #34, tagged as adet, pronounced /ɪ̈z/.
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 261, this pair ranks #529,662 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of he's vs his
Shared letters: hs. Private to "he's": e. Private to "his": i.
"he's" · 3 letters · shape CVC · "his" · 3 letters · shape CVC