Which to use
“thaw” is a verb and “thy” is a determiner - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #23,130
- “thaw” frequency rank
- #6,014
- “thy” frequency rank
- 29144
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | thaw | thy |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | To gradually melt, dissolve, or become fluid; to soften from frozen. | Possessive form of thou: that which belongs to thee; which belongs to you (singular). |
Where the eye mixes thaw and thy
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.
Look-alike desk: thaw vs thy
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: thaw is /θɔː/ while thy is /ðaɪ/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (verb vs determiner), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 29144, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
thaw is recorded at frequency rank #23,130, classified as averb, pronounced /θɔː/. thy is at rank #6,014, tagged as adet, pronounced /ðaɪ/.
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 29144, this pair ranks #365,456 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of thaw vs thy
Shared letters: ht. Private to "thaw": aw. Private to "thy": y.
"thaw" · 4 letters · shape CCVC · "thy" · 3 letters · shape CCV
Known mistypes of this pair
- thaw ← htaw · tahw · thaww · thhaw · thwa · tthaw
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "thaw" for "thy" ever safe?
In ordinary English text, does "thaw" or "thy" show up more?
Useful next steps
Eye-level mix-up between "thaw" and "thy" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.
- Full dictionary entry for "thaw" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "thy" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #365,456 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "thaw" and "thy" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "thaw vs Trav". 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 #365,456 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.