Homophone

A homophone (/ˈhɒməfoʊn, ˈhoʊmə-/) is a word that is pronounced the same (to a varying extent) as another word but differs in meaning. The two words may be spelled the same, for example rose (flower) and rose (past tense of "rise"), or spelled differently, as in rain, reign, and rein. The term homophone sometimes applies to units longer or shorter than words, for example a phrase, letter, or groups of letters which are pronounced the same as a counterpart. Any unit with this property is said to be homophonous (/həˈmɒfənəs/).

Homophones that are spelled the same are deemed both homographs and homonyms, e.g. the word read, as in "He is well read" (he is very learned) vs. the sentence "I read that book" (I have finished reading that book).^[a]

Homophones that are spelled differently are also called heterographs, e.g. to, too, and two.

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