Which to use
“hea” is a noun and “heals” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #44,248
- “hea” frequency rank
- #19,104
- “heals” frequency rank
- 63352
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | hea | heals |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Alternative spelling of hea'. | third-person singular simple present indicative of heal |
Letter map: hea vs heals
Shared letters muted; letters that set hea and heals apart highlighted. Shared run: 3. hea runs 3 letters (CVV) against heals's 5 (CVVCC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Role in the sentence - hea and heals
Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: hea is anoun and healsaverb. On the page they differ by 2 extra letter(s) - “hea” sits inside “heals”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 63352, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
hea is recorded at frequency rank #44,248, classified as anoun. heals is at rank #19,104, tagged as averb, pronounced /hiːlz/.
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 63352, this pair ranks #83,471 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of hea vs heals
Shared letters: aeh. Private to "hea": -. Private to "heals": ls.
"hea" · 3 letters · shape CVV · "heals" · 5 letters · shape CVVCC
Known mistypes of this pair
- heals ← ehals · haels · healls · healss · heasl · helas · hheals
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "hea" for "heals" ever safe?
In ordinary English text, does "hea" or "heals" show up more?
Useful next steps
Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "hea" and "heals".
- Full dictionary entry for "hea" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "heals" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #83,471 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "hea" and "heals" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "hea vs Herat". 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 #83,471 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.