# shire vs smile

> English confusable word pair

## The two words

### shire
*noun · IPA /ʃaɪə/ · frequency rank #15,700*
An administrative area or district between about the 5th to the 11th century, subdivided into hundreds or wapentakes and jointly governed by an ealdorman and a sheriff; also, a present-day area corresponding to such a historical district; a county; especially (England), a county having a name ending in -shire.

### smile
*noun · IPA /ˈsmaɪl/ · frequency rank #2,316*
A facial expression comprised by flexing the muscles of both ends of one's mouth, often showing the front teeth, without vocalisation, and in humans is a common involuntary or voluntary expression of happiness, pleasure, amusement, goodwill, or anxiety.

## Source
Compiled from Wiktionary via kaikki.org (CC BY-SA). Data vintage: 2026-05-06.
Canonical page: https://plainspell.com/en/vs/shire-vs-smile