holes
/həʊlz/
"holes" is a 5-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“holes” is a regularly-used English word, ranked #3,949 in English word frequency and used as a noun.
- #3,949
- frequency rank, English
- 5
- letters
- 7
- tracked misspellings
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - plural of hole
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 | holes |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /həʊlz/ |
| Letters | 5 |
| Frequency rank | #3,949 |
| Misspellings tracked | 7 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “holes” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for holes is 5 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /həʊlz/. Corpus data places it at rank #3,949 in overall English word frequency, indicating it appears regularly in written and spoken text. The dominant gloss from Wiktionary reads: "plural of hole".
Our generated misspelling index lists 7 likely wrong-spelling variants for holes, with forms such as "hholes", "hloes", and "hoels". Each of these forms differs from the correct spelling by one small edit: a doubled letter, a dropped silent letter, or a substituted vowel. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "hos", "home", "hope", and more, since the words sound or look close enough that writers reach for the wrong one mid-sentence.
This entry's etymology isn't recorded, so its spelling is easiest to reason about phoneme by phoneme, absent a documented history. The correct English form is holes, spelled H-O-L-E-S.
Definition
- 1plural of hole
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: hholes,hloes,hoels,holess,holles,holse,ohles
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of holes - expressed in single-character edits (insert, delete, or swap one letter). Bigger bars stand out at a glance; a one-edit slip is the hardest to catch.
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 “holes”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is H-O-L-E-S - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /həʊlz/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “hos” - see the side-by-side comparison. holes vs hos
- 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.