hopevshordeWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

“hope” and “horde” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#12,794
“hope” frequency rank
#16,642
“horde” frequency rank
29436
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature hope horde
Definition Espoir, espérance. Tribu nomade d’Asie centrale.

Where the eye mixes hope and horde

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.

4 ch
hope
5 ch
horde

Visual trap between hope and horde

A purely visual mix-up. hope (\həʊp\) and horde (^((h aspiré))\ɔʁd\) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 29436, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

hope is recorded at frequency rank #12,794, classified as anoun, pronounced \həʊp\. horde is at rank #16,642, tagged as anoun, pronounced ^((h aspiré))\ɔʁd\.

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 29436, this pair ranks #316,681 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of hope vs horde

Shared letters: eho. Private to "hope": p. Private to "horde": dr.

"hope" · 4 letters · shape CVCV  ·  "horde" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • hopehhope · hoep · hoppe · hpoe · ohpe
  • hordehhorde · hodre · hordde · hored · horrde · hrode · ohrde

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "hope" and "horde" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently (\həʊp\ versus ^((h aspiré))\ɔʁd\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "hope" or "horde"?
"hope" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #12,794 in our French list, against #16,642 for "horde". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Eye-level mix-up between "hope" and "horde" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "hope" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "horde" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #316,681 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "hope" and "horde" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "horde vs Houda". 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 #316,681 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list