“heel” vs. “he'll”
Pick "heel" for the foot, the shoe part, or the wrestling villain; save the apostrophe form for wherever "he will" would slot in naturally.
heel
"Heel" names the rear portion of a foot or shoe, and informally labels a dishonorable or contemptible person ("the shoe's heel wore down unevenly"). It traces to Old English "hela," a plain anatomical term with no link at all to any verb of recovery. In dressmaking and cobbling, "heel" also names the reinforced back panel of a sock or stocking.
he'll
"He'll" is the contraction of "he will" or "he shall," predicting or promising future action ("he'll be late again"). The apostrophe replaces the missing letters from "will," following the same pattern as "she'll" and "they'll." "He'll" always sets up an expectation about a future event, which is why it pairs naturally with words like "probably," "eventually," and "soon."
The real distinction
Pronounced nearly identically in casual speech, these two words otherwise share nothing — one is a body-part or shoe noun, the other a pronoun-plus-verb contraction predicting the future. "Heel" is always a physical thing (or a character judgment, as in slang for a scoundrel) and never involves future action. "He'll" always signals something "he" is going to do, and expanding it to "he will" should make grammatical sense in the sentence. If your sentence names a body part, a shoe part, or describes a dog-training command, you need "heel"; if it predicts what "he" is going to do, you need "he'll." Because the words sound alike, checking meaning rather than sound is the reliable method here. Because "heel" as slang for a villain appears often in sports and entertainment writing, and "heel" as a dog command appears often in pet-training guides, context clues from those fields make the noun sense easy to spot. "He'll," by contrast, only ever appears attached to a future-tense verb describing what a specific male subject is going to do.
Examples with “heel”
- The nail scraped the back of her heel.
- His boot's heel was worn down from years of hiking.
- The trainer taught the puppy to heel on command.
- She rubbed her sore heel after the long run.
- A blister formed on his heel from the new shoes.
- The dancer pivoted sharply on her heel.
- The old villain in the film was a classic heel.
- The cobbler repaired the cracked leather heel.
- The show cast him as the villain, the classic heel.
- Her shoe's heel wobbled on the cobblestone street.
- The tailor reinforced the sock's heel with extra thread.
- The high heel left a mark on the hardwood floor.
- She adjusted the strap just above her heel.
- The nurse checked the newborn's heel for the routine blood test.
- She dug her heel into the sand as the tide rolled in.
- The shoemaker reinforced the heel before the marathon.
Examples with “he'll”
- He'll finish the report before lunch tomorrow.
- She's certain he'll apologize once he calms down.
- He'll need a ride to the airport on Friday.
- If it rains, he'll reschedule the picnic.
- He'll probably win the tournament this year.
- The teacher said he'll retake the test next week.
- He'll bring the extra chairs for the party.
- According to the itinerary, he'll land at noon.
- He'll manage the store while the owner is away.
- The forecast says he'll need an umbrella tomorrow.
- He'll double-check the numbers before submitting the invoice.
- He'll probably ask for an extension on the deadline.
- The manual says he'll need a screwdriver for step three.
- He'll coordinate with the vendors once the venue is confirmed.
- He'll take the early train if the meeting runs late.
- He'll double back for the forgotten passport.
Memory trick
"Heel" doubles its "e" the same way "feet" doubles its vowel — both are foot-related words with a matching double-letter pattern. "He'll" always collapses "he will" into one word, so testing whether "he will" fits the sentence is the fastest way to confirm the apostrophe belongs. Try reading the sentence with will spelled out fully; if it still makes sense, the apostrophe form is correct.