Which to use
“heals” and “held” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #19,104
- “heals” frequency rank
- #572
- “held” frequency rank
- 19676
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | heals | held |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | third-person singular simple present indicative of heal | simple past and past participle of hold |
Where the eye mixes heals and held
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.
Look-alike desk: heals vs held
A purely visual mix-up. heals (/hiːlz/) and held (/ˈhɛld/) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 19676, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
heals is recorded at frequency rank #19,104, classified as averb, pronounced /hiːlz/. held is at rank #572, tagged as averb, pronounced /ˈhɛld/.
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 19676, this pair ranks #436,503 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of heals vs held
Shared letters: ehl. Private to "heals": as. Private to "held": d.
"heals" · 5 letters · shape CVVCC · "held" · 4 letters · shape CVCC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "heals" for "held" ever safe?
Which is more common, "heals" or "held"?
What to do next
Eye-level mix-up between "heals" and "held" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.
- Full dictionary entry for "heals" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "held" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #436,503 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "heals" and "held" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "heals vs HMAS". 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 #436,503 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.