Homophone Clues in Cryptic Crosswords — How to Spot and Solve Them

Homophone clues turn cryptic crosswords into a listening exercise. The answer sounds like another word in the clue, but is spelled differently. Once you train your ear for the indicators, these clues are genuinely satisfying — they reward reading out loud, which few other puzzle types do.

A homophone clue contains a definition of the answer and a definition of a word that sounds identical to it. An indicator tells you to treat that second definition as something heard rather than read.

How Homophone Clues Work

The setter finds two words that sound the same but are spelled differently (for example BEAR and BARE, or KNIGHT and NIGHT). One of them is the answer. The clue provides a definition of the answer in the normal way, and a definition of the sound-alike partner joined by a homophone indicator.

The three parts:

1. Definition — a straight synonym of the answer, at the start or end of the clue
2. Homophone indicator — a word suggesting sound or speech (heard, said, reportedly)
3. Sound-alike definition — a definition of a word that sounds like the answer

Worked Examples

Example 1: A Textbook Homophone

"Naked, we hear, a large mammal (4)"

Step by step:

1. Spot the indicator: "we hear" — a homophone signal
2. Identify the definition: "a large mammal" at the end — 4 letters
3. Work out the sound-alike: "naked" = BARE. Does BARE sound like any 4-letter large mammal? BEAR — yes. BARE and BEAR are pronounced identically
4. Check: does BEAR mean a large mammal? Yes. Enumeration: 4. Match.

Answer: BEAR

The two halves of the clue ("naked" and "a large mammal") lead to two different words that happen to sound identical. The indicator tells you to hear, not read.

Example 2: KNIGHT / NIGHT

"Evening, reportedly a medieval warrior (6)"

Step by step:

1. Spot the indicator: "reportedly" — homophone signal
2. Identify the definition: "a medieval warrior" at the end — 6 letters
3. Work out the sound-alike: "evening" = NIGHT. Does NIGHT sound like a 6-letter warrior? KNIGHT — identical pronunciation, different spelling
4. Check: does KNIGHT mean a medieval warrior? Yes. Enumeration: 6. Match.

Answer: KNIGHT

This is a favourite pair because the silent "K" genuinely disguises the connection. You hear NIGHT and KNIGHT the same, but you'd never link them on the page.

Example 3: SOLE / SOUL

"Only, they say, is the spirit (4)"

Step by step:

1. Spot the indicator: "they say" — homophone signal
2. Identify the definition: "the spirit" at the end — 4 letters
3. Work out the sound-alike: "only" = SOLE. SOLE sounds like SOUL — both 4 letters
4. Check: does SOUL mean the spirit? Yes. Enumeration: 4. Match.

Answer: SOUL

Notice how the whole clue reads as a plausible sentence ("Only, they say, is the spirit") even though its cryptic grammar is doing something completely different. That's the craft.

Example 4: A Pair Clue

"Two's company, reportedly, is a fruit (4)"

Step by step:

1. Spot the indicator: "reportedly" — homophone signal
2. Identify the definition: "a fruit" at the end — 4 letters
3. Work out the sound-alike: "two's company" hints at PAIR (a couple, two things together). PAIR sounds like PEAR
4. Check: does PEAR mean a fruit? Yes. Enumeration: 4. Match.

Answer: PEAR

The sound-alike half ("two's company") doesn't define the answer — it defines PAIR, which sounds like PEAR. The definition half ("a fruit") points straight at the answer.

How to Spot Homophone Clues

The indicator is the most reliable signal. Anything suggesting hearing, speech, or sound is a candidate.

Common Homophone Indicators

Hearing: heard, audibly, to the ear, overheard, listening to, by the sound of it

Speech and saying: said, sounds like, reportedly, we hear, they say, apparently, so to speak, by all accounts, rumour has it, allegedly

Spoken delivery: vocally, orally, in speech, spoken, when spoken, on the radio, broadcast, announced, declared, proclaimed

Ambiguous: "say" is overloaded — it can mean a homophone ("said") or an example ("for example"). Check both readings.

The Pronunciation Check

British cryptic crosswords use received pronunciation (RP). When checking a candidate homophone:

1. Speak the two words out loud — do they sound identical in RP?
2. Watch for pairs that only work in some accents — "caught" and "court" are homophones in RP but not in most American accents. "Wine" and "whine" merge for most speakers but not all.
3. Accept near-homophones cautiously — some setters allow loose homophones where the stress differs but the sounds are close. Purists object, but they appear in published puzzles.

Common Homophone Pairs in Cryptic Crosswords

A handful of pairs appear repeatedly because they give setters useful raw material:

Classic pairs: knight/night, knot/not, sole/soul, paw/pour, bare/bear, sale/sail, ail/ale, road/rode, seize/seas, mane/main, hair/hare, dear/deer, meat/meet, write/right, threw/through, for/four/fore, sew/so/sow, lead/led, read/reed, steal/steel, tea/tee, piece/peace, plane/plain, suite/sweet, stake/steak, pair/pear, flower/flour, heir/air, sole/soul, principal/principle.

Common Mistakes

Forgetting context-sensitive pronunciation. "Caught" and "court" are homophones in RP but not in many accents. Check the puzzle's origin — British broadsheets use RP. "Merry", "marry", and "Mary" merge in some American accents but are distinct in RP.

Confusing "say" as a homophone vs example indicator. "Say" can signal either a homophone ("sounds like") or an example ("for example"). Context matters: if "say" appears alongside a word that has an obvious sound-alike, it's a homophone; if it follows a specific item of a category ("singer, say, in the choir"), it's an example indicator.

Accepting loose rhymes. Homophones must sound identical, not merely rhyme. "Road" and "rode" are homophones; "road" and "rod" are not. If you need to squint your ears, it's probably not a homophone.

Ignoring stress. Some near-homophones differ only in stress (e.g. "desert" the noun vs "desert" the verb). Most setters treat these as too loose, but a few will use them.

Missing the split. In a homophone clue, the definition and the sound-alike definition are two separate halves. Don't try to make the sound-alike define the answer directly — it defines the word that sounds like the answer.

Keep Going

Homophones train your ear in a way no other clue type does. If you've just solved one, try reading it aloud to see the sound-alike click.

Try our cryptic crossword solver for the clue you're working on — it'll flag homophone indicators and check candidate answers against the sound-alike half of the clue.

Once homophones click, try double definition clues — they also rely on two readings of the same word, but without the sound-alike twist. Or try anagram clues, the most common type you'll encounter.