shipvssisWhat's the difference?

Which to use

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

#1,254
“ship” frequency rank
#12,501
“sis” frequency rank
13755
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature ship sis
Definition A water-borne vessel generally larger than a boat. Clipping of sister.

Where the eye mixes ship and sis

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.

4 ch
ship
3 ch
sis

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

A purely visual mix-up. ship (/ʃɪp/) and sis (/sɪs/) 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 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 13755, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

ship is recorded at frequency rank #1,254, classified as anoun, pronounced /ʃɪp/. sis is at rank #12,501, tagged as anoun, pronounced /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 13755, this pair ranks #473,986 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of ship vs sis

Shared letters: is. Private to "ship": hp. Private to "sis": -.

"ship" · 4 letters · shape CCVC  ·  "sis" · 3 letters · shape CVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • shiphsip · shhip · shipp · shpi · sihp · sship

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "ship" and "sis" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently (/ʃɪp/ versus /sɪs/) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "ship" or "sis"?
"ship" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #1,254 in our English list, against #12,501 for "sis". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

You've compared "ship" and "sis". Here's where to go from here.

  • Full dictionary entry for "ship" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "sis" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #473,986 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "ship" and "sis" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "sis vs suds". 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

PlainSpell is a reference corpus, not spelling advice. Verify unusual forms in context.

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list