theirvstheseWhich spelling fits?

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

Which to use

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

#7,842
“their” frequency rank
#18,727
“these” frequency rank
26569
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature their these
Definition futuro do verbo abair vide tese

Letter map: their vs these

Shared letters muted; letters that set their and these apart highlighted. Shared run: 3.

5 ch
their
5 ch
these

Role in the sentence - their and these

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: their is averb and theseanoun. On the page they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 26569, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

their is recorded at frequency rank #7,842, classified as averb, pronounced /he:r/. these is at rank #18,727, tagged as anoun.

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 26569, this pair ranks #42,572 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of their vs these

Shared letters: eht. Private to "their": ir. Private to "these": s.

"their" · 5 letters · shape CCVVC  ·  "these" · 5 letters · shape CCVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • theirhteir · tehir · theirr · theri · thheir · thier · ttheir
  • thesehtese · tehse · thees · thesse · thhese · thsee · tthese

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "their" for "these" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "their" is a verb and "these" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "their" or "these"?
"their" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #7,842 in our Portuguese list, against #18,727 for "these". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "their" and "these".

  • Full dictionary entry for "their" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "these" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #42,572 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "their" and "these" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "tee vs these". 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 #42,572 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