abrisvsanisWhat's the difference?

Which to use

“abris” and “anis” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#10,110
“abris” frequency rank
#27,690
“anis” frequency rank
37800
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature abris anis
Definition Pluriel de abri. Plante odoriférante de la famille des ombellifères, qui porte une graine de même nom, dont on se sert en médecine et dont on fait aussi de petites dragées, de l’anisette, etc.

Where the eye mixes abris and anis

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.

5 ch
abris
4 ch
anis

Why the eye confuses abris with anis

A purely visual mix-up. abris (\a.bʁi\) and anis (\a.nis\) 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 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 37800, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

abris is recorded at frequency rank #10,110, classified as anoun, pronounced \a.bʁi\. anis is at rank #27,690, tagged as anoun, pronounced \a.nis\.

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 37800, this pair ranks #259,849 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of abris vs anis

Shared letters: ais. Private to "abris": br. Private to "anis": n.

"abris" · 5 letters · shape VCCVC  ·  "anis" · 4 letters · shape VCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • abrisabbris · abirs · abriss · abrris · abrsi · arbis · baris
  • anisaniss · annis · ansi · nais

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "abris" and "anis" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\a.bʁi\ versus \a.nis\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary French text, does "abris" or "anis" show up more?
"abris" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #10,110 in our French list, against #27,690 for "anis". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Eye-level mix-up between "abris" and "anis" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "abris" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "anis" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #259,849 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "abris" and "anis" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "anis vs aves". 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 #259,849 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list