headvsheyTell them apart

Quick tell: head is a adjective, hey is an intj, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“head” is an adjective and “hey” is an intj - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#10,735
“head” frequency rank
#6,190
“hey” frequency rank
16925
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature head hey
Definition central (principal) oi; olá (usada como saudação)

Letter map: head vs hey

Shared letters muted; letters that set head and hey apart highlighted. Shared run: 2.

4 ch
head
3 ch
hey

Grammar separator: head vs hey

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: head is anadjective and heyanintj. On the page they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 16925, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

head is recorded at frequency rank #10,735, classified as anadj. hey is at rank #6,190, tagged as anintj, pronounced /ˈhɛi/.

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 16925, this pair ranks #54,471 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of head vs hey

Shared letters: eh. Private to "head": ad. Private to "hey": y.

"head" · 4 letters · shape CVVC  ·  "hey" · 3 letters · shape CVV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • headehad · haed · headd · heda · hhead

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "head" for "hey" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "head" is an adjective and "hey" an intj, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "head" vs "hey" - which ranks higher?
"hey" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #6,190 in our Portuguese list, against #10,735 for "head". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "head" and "hey".

  • Full dictionary entry for "head" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "hey" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #54,471 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "head" and "hey" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "head vs Hebe". 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 #54,471 of 75,631 scored Portuguese pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list