ThorvsthouWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: Thor is a name, thou is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“Thor” is a name and “thou” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#18,084
“Thor” frequency rank
#44,777
“thou” frequency rank
62861
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature Thor thou
Definition Dieu nordique du tonnerre. Écluse en pierre ou en béton permettant de vider lentement les étangs de la Dombes dans l'Ain.

Where the eye mixes Thor and thou

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

4 ch
Thor
4 ch
thou

Look-alike desk: Thor vs thou

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: Thor is \tɔʁ\ while thou is \tu\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by a single letter - r in “Thor” becomes u in “thou”, and the parts of speech differ too (name vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 62861, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

Thor is recorded at frequency rank #18,084, classified as aname, pronounced \tɔʁ\. thou is at rank #44,777, tagged as anoun, pronounced \tu\.

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 62861, this pair ranks #84,876 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of Thor vs thou

Shared letters: hot. Private to "Thor": r. Private to "thou": u.

"Thor" · 4 letters · shape CCVC  ·  "thou" · 4 letters · shape CCVV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • Thor ← htor · thhor · thorr · thro · tohr · tthor
  • thou ← htou · thhou · thuo · tohu · tthou

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "Thor" and "thou" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "Thor" is a name and "thou" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "Thor" vs "thou" - which ranks higher?
"Thor" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #18,084 in our French list, against #44,777 for "thou". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "Thor" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "thou" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #84,876 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "Thor" and "thou" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "thou vs tos". 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 #84,876 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