iesvsIsisWhat's the difference?

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

Which to use

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

#45,988
“ies” frequency rank
#4,536
“Isis” frequency rank
50524
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature ies Isis
Definition plural of i, the name of the letter I. An ancient Egyptian goddess, the wife of Osiris and mother of Horus, worshiped as the ideal mother and wife and as the matron of nature and magic; also worshiped by (some) Greeks during the Hellenistic period and featured in Greek mythology, and by Romans involved in what was categorized as the Cult of Isis.

Letter map: ies vs Isis

Shared letters muted; letters that set ies and Isis apart highlighted. Shared run: 2.

3 ch
ies
4 ch
Isis

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: ies is anoun and Isisaname. On the page they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 50524, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

ies is recorded at frequency rank #45,988, classified as anoun. Isis is at rank #4,536, tagged as aname, pronounced /ˈaɪ.sɪs/.

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 50524, this pair ranks #173,501 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of ies vs Isis

Shared letters: is. Private to "ies": e. Private to "Isis": -.

"ies" · 3 letters · shape VVC  ·  "Isis" · 4 letters · shape VCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • Isisiiss · isiss · issi · issis · siis

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "ies" and "Isis" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "ies" is a noun and "Isis" a name, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "ies" or "Isis"?
"Isis" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #4,536 in our English list, against #45,988 for "ies". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list