he
/ˈhiː/
"he" is a 2-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“he” is in the everyday core of English, ranked #22 in English word frequency and used as a pronoun.
- #22
- frequency rank, English
- 2
- letters
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - A person who identifies as male, or animal already known or implied.
Visual similarity to commonly confused words
How many letter changes separate each confused pair (Levenshtein distance, normalized).
Source: PlainSpell confusable corpus (Wiktionary, CC BY-SA).
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | he |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Pronoun |
| IPA | /ˈhiː/ |
| Letters | 2 |
| Frequency rank | #22 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “he” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for he is 2 letters long, classified as a pronoun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /ˈhiː/. Corpus data places it at rank #22 in overall English word frequency, putting it firmly in the everyday core of the language. Wiktionary records 4 distinct senses for this headword, so context determines which meaning a reader should apply.
No generated misspelling entries exist for he in our index, and the word's spelling is regular enough that our generator found nothing worth flagging. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "hi", "ho", "HR", and more, since the words sound or look close enough that writers reach for the wrong one mid-sentence.
Etymologically, the entry records: From Middle English he, from Old English hē, from Proto-West Germanic *hiʀ, from Proto-Germanic *hiz (“this, this one”), from Proto-Indo-European *ḱís (“this”). Cognate with Scots he (“he”), North Frisian he, hi (“he”), Saterland Frisian hie (“he”), West Fr… The correct English form is he, spelled H-E.
Definition
- 1A person who identifies as male, or animal already known or implied.
- 2They; he or she (a person whose gender is unknown or irrelevant).
- 3It; an animal whose gender is unknown.
- 4A genderless object regarded as masculine, such as certain stars or planets (e.g. Sun, Mercury, Mars, Jupiter) or certain ships.
Etymology
From Middle English he, from Old English hē, from Proto-West Germanic *hiʀ, from Proto-Germanic *hiz (“this, this one”), from Proto-Indo-European *ḱís (“this”). Cognate with Scots he (“he”), North Frisian he, hi (“he”), Saterland Frisian hie (“he”), West Frisian hy (“he”), Dutch hij, ie (“he”), German Low German he (“he”), Middle High German her (“he”) Central Franconian hä (“he”), Gothic *𐌷𐌹𐍃 (*his, “this”).
This word in other languages
Definitions, pronunciation, and etymology for this entry are drawn from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org structured extract (CC BY-SA); frequency ordering uses the FrequencyWords open word-frequency list (2018 English corpus, MIT). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.
Frequently Asked Questions
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Using “he”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is H-E - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /ˈhiː/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “hi” - see the side-by-side comparison. he vs hi
- Browse more English words and confusable pairs in the same reference. English words
Data Source
Wiktionary (via kaikki.org), licensed under CC BY-SA & GFDL. Word ordering uses an open word-frequency list; misspelling variants are generated by edit-distance from the correct headword.