Which to use
“ist” is a verb and “its” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #41,994
- “ist” frequency rank
- #18,002
- “its” frequency rank
- 59996
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | ist | its |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Tercera persona del singular (er, sie, es) del presente de indicativo de sein. | Su, sus; que pertenece a un animal o una cosa. |
Where the eye mixes ist and its
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.
Look-alike desk: ist vs its
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: ist is /ɪst/ while its is /ɪts/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ only by swapping two adjacent letters (st ↔ ts) - a transposition the eye reads straight past, and the parts of speech differ too (verb vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 59996, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
ist is recorded at frequency rank #41,994, classified as averb, pronounced /ɪst/. its is at rank #18,002, tagged as anadj, pronounced /ɪts/.
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 59996, this pair ranks #60,523 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of ist vs its
Shared letters: ist. Private to "ist": -. Private to "its": -.
"ist" · 3 letters · shape VCC · "its" · 3 letters · shape VCC
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "ist" and "its" mean the same thing in a sentence?
In ordinary Spanish text, does "ist" or "its" show up more?
Useful next steps
Eye-level mix-up between "ist" and "its" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.
- Full dictionary entry for "ist" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "its" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #60,523 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "ist" and "its" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "ist vs iza". Nearby pair
Confusion rank #60,523 of 323,831 scored Spanish pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.