Which to use
“horde” and “house” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #21,541
- “horde” frequency rank
- #186
- “house” frequency rank
- 21727
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | horde | house |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | A wandering troop or gang; especially, a clan or tribe of a nomadic people (originally Tatars) migrating from place to place for the sake of pasturage, plunder, etc.; a predatory multitude. | A structure built or serving as an abode of human beings. |
Where the eye mixes horde and house
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.
Why the eye confuses horde with house
A purely visual mix-up. horde (/hɔːd/) and house (/haʊs/) 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 21727, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
horde is recorded at frequency rank #21,541, classified as anoun, pronounced /hɔːd/. house is at rank #186, tagged as anoun, pronounced /haʊs/.
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 21727, this pair ranks #421,791 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of horde vs house
Shared letters: eho. Private to "horde": dr. Private to "house": su.
"horde" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV · "house" · 5 letters · shape CVVCV
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Can "horde" and "house" be used interchangeably?
Frequency check: "horde" vs "house" - which ranks higher?
What to do next
Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.
- Full dictionary entry for "horde" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "house" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #421,791 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "horde" and "house" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "hoke vs horde". 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 #421,791 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.