Does the word 'hare' exist in American English?

So, alot of Americans live in areas that don't *have* hares. Plus many of the hares in the western US are called jackrabbits, so the term isn't used much here. But any American would recognize the word, and use it if in a situation they knew it was appropriate. Seriously though, the snowshoe hare is the only eastern US hare, and I've never seen one here in the Appalachians in my entire life despite it apparently being present.

Most of the hares in the US are called “jackrabbits;” so, that alone greatly reduces the use of the word

Regardless of wether the word exists in American English or not, not all people who are native English speakers have the same level of literacy, so relying on what a native speaker said is fine for most things but not everything.

I mean the word exists but nobody would ever say it outside of the title "the tortoise and the hare". Even referring to the hare in the story, we would just say rabbit lol.

It exists. But you can go your entire life almost never speaking the word aloud. I must have last said it aloud when I was learning to read as a child

I have no idea what a hare is, other than that it's bigger than a typical rabbit. But it's *basically* a rabbit, and I have no reason to specify the difference, so why would I?

Hare and rabbit aren't interchangeable, they're different species. It's not a personal choice on what word to use, if you want to use it correctly.

Well.. kinda? Americans will never call an animal a hare, they’ll just say rabbit as they’re basically the same. However every American will know *what* a hare is.

If hares are actually different animals than rabbits, that's news to me. But yeah, growing up watching Looney Tunes, I definitely saw the word "hare" a lot, since Bugs Bunny cartoon titles like to make puns or play on the words "bunny," and "rabbit," and "hare." That said, I would never call a rabbit a hare. Not because I have anything against the word, but just because it's not typical around here.

A lot of people always say "rabbit", however "hare" definitely exists and there is a distinction between the two. It is just very rare that people know or use the distinction.

I have heard hare on duolingo for the first time, never heard of it before and our classes were mostly BE.

Hares are not domesticated but there are wild rabbits too. So most people can’t tell the difference. We’re urbanized now. We’re not in touch with nature as other countries.

"Hare" does exist in American English. Famously in "The Tortoise and the Hare", told across the English-speaking world (and in many other languages as well, though not with the word *hare* of course). The only native hare (as far as I know) to the Americas is the jackrabbit, which we just call a *jackrabbit*. Because of this, there is no regular occasion to use the word "hare". But if we were referring to the hares that live in Europe, we would indeed call them *hares*.

As an American, I know and have used the word hare, but 99% of my usage has been the verb 'hare' rather than the noun. I recognize a distinction exists, but I collapse a lot of similar animals into one group. Like, there are many kinds of frogs, and some of them are toads. There are a few kinds of alligators, some of them crocodiles. I know that these classifications are wrong, but in practice, giant lizards with teeth only need one name (I've generally only got to worry about the one, anyway). It's a raw deal for hares, but if you're a small mammal with big ears that hops, tough luck.

Yes, we know what a hare is, but I don’t even know if we have hares here in the US, because I’ve never seen one in the wild. I’ve only seen wild rabbits.  I also think that in most casual conversation, the difference between a rabbit and a hare is just one of those things nobody really cares enough about to correct. Like people often  call horses “ponies,” and it’s incorrect and kind of annoying, but unless the difference between a horse and a pony is *directly* relevant to the current conversation, most people would just let it go. That may be more of a social norm than a language issue. Other examples I can think of: calling a nonfiction book a “novel,” an instrumental piece of music with no vocals a “song,” and one that people get really pedantic about is calling pasta “noodles.” Yes, it is TECHNICALLY incorrect (at least by stricter definitions of the word), but in most social situations where the difference isn’t relevant, correcting someone else’s usage of those words would be seen as rude and pedantic. 

Most Americans know the word "hare." But it sounds extremely old-fashioned and is never used in casual conversation.

Buggs Bunny was all 3. Rabbit, hare, and wabbit. An entire generation has been confused.

We have that word and use it but a lot of Americans don’t live in areas that have hares. I’m from Illinois and we only have rabbits as far as I know.

I grew up with a Dutch hare as a pet. We still called her a rabbit and her name was Barbara Bunny.

A hare and a rabbit are two different animals.

Most people don't interact with hares often enough to know the difference between hares and rabbits.

To add to this, "hare and hound" is a form of desert motorcycle racing popular in the western US. The word isn't commonly used because we mostly call hares jackrabbits in the US, but it is commonly understood.

I recognize that they are two separate things, but generally tend to just use the word "rabbit" for both anyway. Except for bunnies... those I refer to differently (floppy eared).

kind of how tortoise is usually just called a 🐢 turtle ...

Yes, "hare" exists in American English. It's just not something most people ever need to talk about and if they do need to discuss it, they'd say rabbit, not giving a crap about the differences between the 2.

Almost always I hear it called a rabbit, and myself call it a rabbit. If I see ‘hare’ written or hear it said, I translate it as a rabbit and consider the reader/writer either peculiar or targeting a specific style.

It does exist. We sometimes use them interchangeably, but they are not the same animal. [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hare](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hare)

Yeah people almost always say rabbit but I think most people are sort of aware that it's a different animal. It's like a moose/elk thing I'm sure lots of people call an elk a moose just because they're more familiar with the word moose

Yeah, “The Tortoise and the Hare” is a famous parable from Aesop.

Yes, there is the snowshoe hare. *Lepus americanus*, most famous for turning white in winter.

Yes, it does. I think it may be one of those things that comes down to where you are, too. Like, the state I live in, we have snowshoe hares, though we most often call them snowshoes, but hare is still something we say.

Enough people are familiar with the term that it was the name of a saloon called The Wild Hare, a play on [wild hair](https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/wild_hair). Its logo was a jackrabbit.

Hares and rabbits are 2 different animals?!?!?!?!? since when!???????

It exists.

While I agree with most people who have already given an answer, and being someone who does not live in an area with hares, when I picture a hare it’s slender and tall with significantly long ears. Comparatively a rabbit or bunny is short, round, and has shorter OR droopy ears. I might describe a hare as a *type* of rabbit, but I would NEVER call it a bunny.

Sure, it exists. But it's used very infrequently in writing, and almost never in everyday speech. If someone says "I found a hare's den in my front yard," I'd probably have to ask for clarification, and then laugh at myself for not understanding. It's probably about as common as using "boot" for an automobile trunk or "full stop" instead of "period."

Hare is an English word. Of course it exists. We probably have more rabbits, though.

Yes, we know the word. Much of America doesn’t have hares. We only have rabbits. We also use the term bunny. But we know what a hare is. 

Yes, in some contexts, a really big rabbit, usually (what a hare is, anyways)

Hares are 20 times more terrifying than a rabbit.

Makes me think of [this image](https://i.pinimg.com/736x/45/c1/39/45c139895ec6e57de5c2cc8f286e084b.jpg)

The English language is a very precise tool, but the difference here between a hare and a rabbit is so small most people won’t bat an eye at you misusing it. Yes, in science it matters, no in normal conversation it does not.

Yes, but we tend to refer to all of those types of animals as rabbits. We also tend to refer to all of those shelled reptiles as turtles. We also rarely use the word "seek" outside of the game.

We’d say it more if we had more hares. Rabbits and hares are different animals, and rabbits are far, far more common in the US. Most folks will live their whole life never seeing a hare here.

It does. It was in an episode of South Park called “The Hare Club for Men” about a group of men who dress up as the Easter bunny. The name is a pun on “The Hair Club for Men,” which was a company that sold treatments for male baldness.

I know this is wrong, but once after seeing a hare take off like a lightning bolt from a dead stop the thought popped into my head wondering if I had misinterpreted the basis of a 'hair trigger ' my whole life. I mean, I understand it means literally a trigger that takes little to set it off, but that almost works with hare too...

The difference is not big enough for most Americans to care. In fact, some people use them interchangeably. That said, most people nowadays don’t say “hare.” The only time you might hear it is referring to the story, “The Tortoise and the Hare.” Or if a hunter says they are hunting hares.

[In America we prefer to use the *scientific* term, "bun."](https://xkcd.com/1682)

I’m 40 and from the US and I have never encountered a hare in my life. I know that they are “bigger than rabbits and have creepier eyes.” That’s all I can tell you about them. Edit: punctuation

I'd say it's used very rarely. Most people would consider it a type of rabbit, or just another word for rabbit. And since it sounds just like "hair" they would just use rabbit. A biologist or animal breeder may be more likely to make a distinction. On a related note, I found out that some languages consider goats and sheep to be the same animal, and that blew my mind.

Americans also rarely say "echidna," "bandicoot," or "barramundi."

We do, but most people don't know the difference, so we just default to rabbit.  Same way someone might say "look at those crows!" when referring to either a raven or grackle. 

The word does exist in American English, but it's rarely used because hares barely exist in America

I literally never realized, until just now after googling for reference, that "hare" was a different animal and not just an alternate name for a rabbit. Looks like both are lagomorphs and even the same genus (Lepus), which at least calms my heart, but they are indeed different species. American, Southern, for reference.

We say "rabbit" because that's what we see around Easter and in pet shops. The only time most Americans see an actual hare is in a zoo. We don't say "hare" because we almost never see a hare. Don't get me started on yams v sweet potatoes!

I am learning Russian, I'm a native English speaker, the word "hare" (which I of course know what that means) is so very rarely used in English. It's actually not often used in Russian, according to my tutor. Rabbit is much more common.

I would think it's a locality thing. If you live in a place with hares, they're a more common animal, and you'll think about them being different from rabbits, because that conversation will happen naturally because you actually encounter them in real life. So far as I know, no species of hares lives anywhere near me. I'm generally aware that they're a relative of rabbits, but that's basically it. I wouldn't be able to tell them apart on sight, or know when when I'm looking at is a hare or a rabbit. I've heard hares are bigger/longer. So, even when I encounter something that might be a hare online, I'll probably call it a rabbit. Better to use the word that might make me sound uneducated, than to use the word that might make it *seem* like I'm more intelligent, but do it wrong. It's certainly a word that people are generally familiar with, but probably all they know is "it's like a rabbit".

Yes

It’s really not a common word so the only people I can think of who’d be intentionally using it are biologists. I’d think that an average person would just use bunny or rabbit - I know they are different species but only because I am a bio major; I’d not use hare in every day conversations for simplicity.

I think I’d only say it when referring to like a fable, or like the Tortoise and the Hare. Tbh I thought they were synonyms

Yes, usually racing alongside a tortoise. And a lot of Bugs Bunny cartoons have something about "Hare" in the title. However, most hares are native to Eurasia, with only a few species found in the US, and other than the Snowshoe Hare ([which is only found in a few northern states](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snowshoe_hare#/media/File:Lepus_americanus_map.svg)) and Alaskan Hare (which, you can guess where those are all at), most of the *Lepus* species found in the US are **jackrabbits** (and those are mostly found in the desert, which is also sparsely populated). However, non-hare **rabbits** [can be found pretty much all over the place here](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cottontail_rabbit#/media/File:Sylvilagus_scientific_range.jpg), so of course we're going to talk about them much more. >This really confuses me because, well, aren't hares and rabbits just two different animals? Leporidae includes 11 genera; hares are restricted to one genus so while each species generally has a name with "rabbit" or "hare" in it, you can technically say they're all rabbits in the same way humans are apes. Unless you make "rabbit" a paraphyletic group, which is just ludicrous -- that would be like saying humans aren't fish!

We tend to lump both rabbits and hares under the word rabbit even though it is not correct. People who work with animals and/or have a reason to care about the difference grind their teeth and are annoyed, but accept that this is simply the common phrasing. In conclusion: yes the word exists and people know it. We’re just kinda lazy.

Yes. It just a very specific word. I have never seen a hare. But I have seen a rabbit. Also most Americans would probably call a hare a rabbit because of how similar they look.

TIL rabbits and hares are different species

Fwiw, we have rabbits and jackrabbits, which is what I suspect y'all would call a hare. Fwiw, there's a street in my town called "Hare St" and Americans would understand contextually if someone used the word "hare" in regards to a scampery critter that it was a rabbitish creature, but it's not something we would say we saw in the US – – we would say jackrabbit. Although use of the word hair may still occur on the east coast, I'm not sure.

Yes, it does. However, I’m from Hawaii, and we never had native rabbits or hares, and so if I ever saw either, I’d default to using “rabbit” as sort of a blanket term. Also, I’m no animal expert, so if I were asked what the difference between a hare and a rabbit is (or crow/raven and alligator/crocodile for that matter), I wouldn’t be able to answer that.

It exists

Hares and rabbits aren't even the same thing, man.

Hares are bigger and faster, with very long ears. I've seen a few. Rabbits seem more common.

Jackrabbits add to the confusion. A jackrabbit is a hare.

It does, with a couple of caveats. Zoologically they mean different things but many people use them interchangeably in casual conversation. A similar example is many people will refer to all insects and arachnids as "bugs" despite bugs being a specific group of insects. You'll also hear ape and monkey being used  interchangeably sometimes. Sometimes it's unintentional because people don't know the difference, sometimes it's deliberate. Sometimes it's because a word was used before a scientific distinction was made and most people continue to use the word. The word hare comes from Old English hara, meaning rabbit/coney or hare. The word rabbit comes from Old French rabotte, but up until the 19th century rabbit meant "young coney," with coney being the word for that type of animal which fell out of use and was replaced by rabbit. 

It exists, but most people don’t care about the difference between a rabbit and a hare.

Right alongside tortoise.

If it has long ears, a twitchy little nose, and those bitey front teeth like a beaver, and it hops, I’m calling it a “bunny rabbit” (or bunny or rabbit, depending how cute I feel) I know some of them are technically hares, but I have no idea how to tell the difference.

It's actually pretty common around the world to have a distinction between the two, but to use one primarily and only use the other when there is an explicit need to distinguish between a hare and a rabbit. That said, it is not always rabbit that is favored. For example, my sister in law is Russian. Once she gave my daughter a rabbit plushy and told my daughter that in Russian, it's called zayat. A few weeks later, my daughter asks me what her rabbit is called in Russian and I can't remember, so I google it and find it's krolik according to Google translate. My daughter says I'm wrong, she can't remember what it was, but it definitely wasn't krolik. So I call my sister in law and she says zayat. I ask her about krolik and she says it's also a word for rabbit, just not used as much. I look all over to find somewhere that translates rabbit to zayat without any luck.  Many months later, I'm listening to a language podcast and the subject of rabbit vs hare comes up and the host of the podcast points out that in Russia, their "default" word is their word for hare... you guessed it, zayat. 

Assuming that the word 'hare' does not exist in American English is like assuming that 'crocodile' does not exist and that Americans only say 'alligator.' They are different species. While hares and rabbits both belong to the Leporidae family, they differ in size, habitat, and behavior. Hares are generally larger, with longer ears and legs, and are born with fur and open eyes. Rabbits, on the other hand, are smaller, have shorter ears and legs, and are born blind and hairless. That said, while those familiar with wildlife do differentiate between hares and rabbits, not everyone is a naturalist or deeply familiar with the distinctions. In everyday conversation, most Americans default to calling both rabbits unless they are referring to something specific, like a jackrabbit, which is actually a hare. So the word 'hare' absolutely exists, it is just not as commonly used.

I have a friend who gets angry when you call a wasp a bee. "wAsPs aReN't bEeS!!!" It's kind of childish getting upset with such things.

The word "hare" exists in the sense where most Americans see the word, and understand it to be another, fancier word for "rabbit"

I’m going to be honest, I thought hares were boy rabbits.

Hare and rabbit are interchangeable for me, but I rarely use hare. There's a fable called "The Tortoise and the Hare" that I remember from when I was kid, so if kids today still learn this fable, then they would certainly know the word.

This one is interesting. I would say it's a word most Americans know but rarely, if ever, use -- though that may be regional.

So Americans know the word hare? Yes. Can most Americans identify a hare as distinct from a rabbit by looking at it? I doubt it.

The word hare is well known, but most people I know think bunny, hare, and rabbit all mean the same thing. I couldn't tell you the difference myself. I call the cute ones bunnies and the less cute ones rabbits. I never use the word hare, unless I see it on the cage label.

I had no idea it was different animal than a rabbit.