What Are Homophones?

Homophones are those words that sound the same, but are spelt differently—and have different meanings. They seem to confuse a lot of people.

Words such as:

cent, sent and scent
beat and beet
they’re, their and there
raw and roar
board and bored, and so on.

Could visuals help you understand them better?

Take a look at Bruce Worden’s “Homophones, Weakly” to see the words that people often get wrong.

Oh, and by the way, you might often see jokes using homophones, such as:

What did the chess piece say before going to bed? Knight knight.
Why does the lion not enjoy cooked vegetables? He prefers them roar.

Do you know of any?

chess = Schach
knight = Ritter