hartvshearTell them apart

Quick tell: hart is a noun, hear is a verb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“hart” is a noun and “hear” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#18,268
“hart” frequency rank
#41,395
“hear” frequency rank
59663
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature hart hear
Definition Cuerda, soga, en especial la empleada para ejecutar criminales colgandolos. Oír.

Where the eye mixes hart and hear

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. hart (CVCC) and hear (CVVC) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.

4 ch
hart
4 ch
hear

Visual trap between hart and hear

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: hart is /ar/ while hear is /hɪə(ɹ)/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 3 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 59663, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

hart is recorded at frequency rank #18,268, classified as anoun, pronounced /ar/. hear is at rank #41,395, tagged as averb, pronounced /hɪə(ɹ)/.

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 59663, this pair ranks #61,812 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of hart vs hear

Shared letters: ahr. Private to "hart": t. Private to "hear": e.

"hart" · 4 letters · shape CVCC  ·  "hear" · 4 letters · shape CVVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • hart ← ahrt · harrt · hartt · hatr · hhart · hrat
  • hear ← ehar · hearr · hhear

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "hart" for "hear" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "hart" is a noun and "hear" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary Spanish text, does "hart" or "hear" show up more?
"hart" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #18,268 in our Spanish list, against #41,395 for "hear". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "hart" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "hear" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #61,812 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "hart" and "hear" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "hear vs heard". 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 #61,812 of 323,831 scored Spanish pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list