honevshoraWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#23,302
“hone” frequency rank
#49,403
“hora” frequency rank
72705
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature hone hora
Definition A sharpening stone composed of extra-fine grit used for removing the burr or curl from the blade of a razor or some other edge tool. A circle dance popular in the Balkans, Israel and Yiddish culture worldwide.

Letter map: hone vs hora

Shared letters muted; letters that set hone and hora apart highlighted. Shared run: 2. hone and hora follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCV). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

4 ch
hone
4 ch
hora

Spelling & dictionary notes on hone vs hora

hone and hora are indexed as a confusable English pair. We have no recorded pronunciation or part of speech for both members, so the spelling overlap is what we can show you: they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 72705, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

hone is recorded at frequency rank #23,302, classified as anoun, pronounced /hoʊn/. hora is at rank #49,403, tagged as anoun.

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 72705, this pair ranks #42,153 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of hone vs hora

Shared letters: ho. Private to "hone": en. Private to "hora": ar.

"hone" · 4 letters · shape CVCV  ·  "hora" · 4 letters · shape CVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • hone ← hhone · hnoe · hoen · honne · ohne
  • hora ← hhora · hoar · horra · hroa · ohra

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "hone" and "hora" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, but the dictionary glosses above give them different meanings, so swapping one for the other changes what the sentence says.
In ordinary English text, does "hone" or "hora" show up more?
"hone" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #23,302 in our English list, against #49,403 for "hora". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

You've compared "hone" and "hora". Here's where to go from here.

  • Full dictionary entry for "hone" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "hora" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #42,153 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "hone" and "hora" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "hoke vs hora". 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 #42,153 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