Which to use
“sou” and “spout” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #35,525
- “sou” frequency rank
- #25,218
- “spout” frequency rank
- 60743
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | sou | spout |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | An old French copper coin equal to one twentieth of a livre or twelve deniers; one sou is to the livre as one shilling is to the pound. | A tube or lip through which liquid or steam is poured or discharged. |
Where the eye mixes sou and spout
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.
Why the eye confuses sou with spout
A purely visual mix-up. sou (/suː/) and spout (/spaʊt/) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 2 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 60743, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
sou is recorded at frequency rank #35,525, classified as anoun, pronounced /suː/. spout is at rank #25,218, tagged as anoun, pronounced /spaʊt/.
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 60743, this pair ranks #98,323 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of sou vs spout
Shared letters: osu. Private to "sou": -. Private to "spout": pt.
"sou" · 3 letters · shape CVV · "spout" · 5 letters · shape CCVVC
Known mistypes of this pair
- spout ← psout · soput · spotu · spoutt · sppout · spuot · sspout
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "sou" for "spout" ever safe?
Which is more common, "sou" or "spout"?
Useful next steps
Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.
- Full dictionary entry for "sou" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "spout" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #98,323 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "sou" and "spout" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Sif vs sou". 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 #98,323 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.