hidesvshosesWhat's the difference?

Which to use

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

#11,393
“hides” frequency rank
#29,312
“hoses” frequency rank
40705
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature hides hoses
Definition plural of hide plural of hose

Where the eye mixes hides and hoses

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.

5 ch
hides
5 ch
hoses

Visual trap between hides and hoses

A purely visual mix-up. hides (/haɪdz/) and hoses (/ˈhəʊzɪz/) 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 40705, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

hides is recorded at frequency rank #11,393, classified as anoun, pronounced /haɪdz/. hoses is at rank #29,312, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ˈhəʊzɪz/.

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 40705, this pair ranks #265,127 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of hides vs hoses

Shared letters: ehs. Private to "hides": di. Private to "hoses": o.

"hides" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC  ·  "hoses" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • hideshdies · hhides · hiddes · hidess · hidse · hieds · ihdes
  • hoseshhoses · hoess · hosess · hosses · ohses

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "hides" for "hoses" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (/haɪdz/ versus /ˈhəʊzɪz/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "hides" or "hoses"?
"hides" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #11,393 in our English list, against #29,312 for "hoses". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Eye-level mix-up between "hides" and "hoses" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "hides" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "hoses" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #265,127 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "hides" and "hoses" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "hoke vs hoses". 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 #265,127 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list