Which to use
“prince” and “princes” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #1,960
- “prince” frequency rank
- #11,443
- “princes” frequency rank
- 13403
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | prince | princes |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | A (male) ruler, a sovereign; a king, monarch. | plural of prince |
Where the eye mixes prince and princes
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 6 letters in sequence. prince runs 6 letters (CCVCCV) against princes's 7 (CCVCCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Why the eye confuses prince with princes
A purely visual mix-up. prince (/pɹɪns/) and princes (/ˈpɹɪnsɪz/) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 1 extra letter(s) - “prince” sits inside “princes”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 13403, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
prince is recorded at frequency rank #1,960, classified as anoun, pronounced /pɹɪns/. princes is at rank #11,443, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ˈpɹɪnsɪz/.
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 13403, this pair ranks #476,027 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of prince vs princes
Shared letters: ceinpr. Private to "prince": -. Private to "princes": s.
"prince" · 6 letters · shape CCVCCV · "princes" · 7 letters · shape CCVCCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "prince" and "princes" mean the same thing in a sentence?
Which is more common, "prince" or "princes"?
What to do next
Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.
- Full dictionary entry for "prince" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "princes" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #476,027 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "prince" and "princes" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "princes vs prunes". 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 #476,027 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.