formsvsFrançoisTell them apart

Quick tell: forms is a verb, François is a name, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“forms” is a verb and “François” is a name - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#45,276
“forms” frequency rank
#11,052
“François” frequency rank
56328
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature forms François
Definition 3. Person Singular Indikativ Präsens Aktiv des Verbs form männlicher Vorname

Letter map: forms vs François

Shared letters muted; letters that set forms and François apart highlighted. Shared run: 3. forms runs 5 letters (CVCCC) against François's 8 (CCVCCVVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

5 ch
forms
8 ch
François

Role in the sentence - forms and François

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: forms is averb and Françoisaname. On the page they differ by 3 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 56328, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

forms is recorded at frequency rank #45,276, classified as averb, pronounced […]. François is at rank #11,052, tagged as aname, pronounced […].

Glosses for this pair are partially populated in our dataset, but the full side-by-side definitions above should still guide you to the right choice.

With a confusion score of 56328, this pair ranks #944,556 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of forms vs François

Shared letters: fors. Private to "forms": m. Private to "François": ainç.

"forms" · 5 letters · shape CVCCC  ·  "François" · 8 letters · shape CCVCCVVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • forms ← fforms · fomrs · formms · formss · forrms · forsm · froms · ofrms

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "forms" and "François" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "forms" is a verb and "François" a name, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary German text, does "forms" or "François" show up more?
"François" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #11,052 in our German list, against #45,276 for "forms". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

You've compared "forms" and "François". Here's where to go from here.

  • Full dictionary entry for "forms" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "François" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #944,556 of 2,006,359 scored German confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "forms" and "François" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "forms vs puzzles". Nearby pair
  • Recorded mistypes exist for at least one side of this pair, useful when a spell-checker or OCR lands on the wrong form. See mistypes

Confusion rank #944,556 of 2,006,359 scored German pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list