HoarevshoeConfusable pair

Quick tell: Hoare is a name, hoe is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“Hoare” is a name and “hoe” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#49,979
“Hoare” frequency rank
#20,954
“hoe” frequency rank
70933
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature Hoare hoe
Definition A surname. Any of various tools for scraping, scratching, digging, or stirring soil or other materials.

Letter map: Hoare vs hoe

Shared letters muted; letters that set Hoare and hoe apart highlighted. Shared run: 3.

5 ch
Hoare
3 ch
hoe

Grammar separator: Hoare vs hoe

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: Hoare is aname and hoeanoun. On the page they differ by 2 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 70933, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

Hoare is recorded at frequency rank #49,979, classified as aname. hoe is at rank #20,954, tagged as anoun, pronounced /həʊ/.

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 70933, this pair ranks #48,670 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of Hoare vs hoe

Shared letters: eho. Private to "Hoare": ar. Private to "hoe": -.

"Hoare" · 5 letters · shape CVVCV  ·  "hoe" · 3 letters · shape CVV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • Hoarehaore · hhoare · hoaer · hoarre · horae · ohare

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "Hoare" for "hoe" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "Hoare" is a name and "hoe" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary English text, does "Hoare" or "hoe" show up more?
"hoe" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #20,954 in our English list, against #49,979 for "Hoare". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "Hoare" and "hoe".

  • Full dictionary entry for "Hoare" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "hoe" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #48,670 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "Hoare" and "hoe" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Hoare vs hoke". 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 #48,670 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