Homograph or homophone?
homograph is a noun meaning “A word that is spelled the same as another word, usually having a different…”; homophone is a noun meaning “A word which is pronounced the same as another word but differs in spelling or…”. In written English (wordfreq, 2021 data) homophone is about 5.4 times as common as homograph.
What is the difference between homograph and homophone?
| homograph | homophone | |
|---|---|---|
| Part of speech | noun | noun |
| Meaning | A word that is spelled the same as another word, usually having a different etymology A text character or string that looks identical to another when rendered | A word which is pronounced the same as another word but differs in spelling or meaning or origin A letter or group of letters which are pronounced the same as another letter or group of letters |
| Example | none recorded | none recorded |
| Forms | homographs | homophones |
| Pronunciation | /ˈhɒməɡɹɑːf/ /ˈhəʊməɡɹæf/ /ˈhɑːməɡɹæf/ | /ˈhɒməfəʊn/ /ˈhɑməfoʊn/ /ˈhɔməfəʉn/ |
| In writing | about once in every 72 million words | about once in every 13 million words |
Sources: homograph and homophone in the English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0); written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
Every current meaning of homograph and homophone
homograph
- 1
A word that is spelled the same as another word, usually having a different etymology
- 2
A text character or string that looks identical to another when rendered
homophone
- 1
A word which is pronounced the same as another word but differs in spelling or meaning or origin
- 2
A letter or group of letters which are pronounced the same as another letter or group of letters
Source: the English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0); obsolete, archaic, dialect and rare senses left out.
Which is more common, homograph or homophone?
homograph appears about once in every 72 million words; homophone about once in every 13 million words.
homograph about once in every 72 million wordshomophone about once in every 13 million words
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
How many people search homograph vs homophone?
“homograph vs homophone” is searched about 720 times a month on Google and 30 on Bing in the United States. Google counts close variants of a query together (“homophone vs homograph”, “homograph or homophone”).
Sources: Google Ads keyword data through DataForSEO and Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, the average month from September 2025 to August 2026.