YivsyrWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: Yi is a noun, yr is a determiner, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“Yi” is a noun and “yr” is a determiner - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#11,999
“Yi” frequency rank
#9,838
“yr” frequency rank
21837
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature Yi yr
Definition An ethnic group who live primarily in mountainous areas of southwest China. Abbreviation of your.

Letter map: Yi vs yr

Shared letters muted; letters that set Yi and yr apart highlighted. Shared run: 1.

2 ch
Yi
2 ch
yr

Part-of-speech tell for Yi / yr

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: Yi is anoun and yradeterminer. On the page they differ by a single letter - i in “Yi” becomes r in “yr”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 21837, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

Yi is recorded at frequency rank #11,999, classified as anoun. yr is at rank #9,838, tagged as adet.

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 21837, this pair ranks #420,986 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of Yi vs yr

Shared letters: y. Private to "Yi": i. Private to "yr": r.

"Yi" · 2 letters · shape VV  ·  "yr" · 2 letters · shape VC

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "Yi" for "yr" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "Yi" is a noun and "yr" a determiner, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "Yi" vs "yr" - which ranks higher?
"yr" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #9,838 in our English list, against #11,999 for "Yi". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "Yi" and "yr".

  • Full dictionary entry for "Yi" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "yr" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #420,986 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "Yi" and "yr" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Yau vs Yi". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #420,986 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list