hidevshopeWhat's the difference?

Which to use

“hide” and “hope” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#2,794
“hide” frequency rank
#346
“hope” frequency rank
3140
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature hide hope
Definition To put (something) in a place where it will be out of sight or harder to discover. To want (something) to happen, with a sense of expectation that it might [with that (+ clause); or (informal) with clause; or with so or (negative) not].

Where the eye mixes hide and hope

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.

4 ch
hide
4 ch
hope

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

A purely visual mix-up. hide (/haɪd/) and hope (/həʊp/) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 3140, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

hide is recorded at frequency rank #2,794, classified as averb, pronounced /haɪd/. hope is at rank #346, tagged as averb, pronounced /həʊp/.

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 3140, this pair ranks #522,998 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of hide vs hope

Shared letters: eh. Private to "hide": di. Private to "hope": op.

"hide" · 4 letters · shape CVCV  ·  "hope" · 4 letters · shape CVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • hidehdie · hhide · hidde · hied · ihde
  • hopehhope · hoep · hoppe · hpoe · ohpe

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "hide" and "hope" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently (/haɪd/ versus /həʊp/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "hide" or "hope"?
"hope" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #346 in our English list, against #2,794 for "hide". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list