aillesvsaisesWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: ailles is a verb, aises is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“ailles” is a verb and “aises” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#25,192
“ailles” frequency rank
#41,636
“aises” frequency rank
66828
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature ailles aises
Definition Deuxième personne du singulier du subjonctif présent du verbe aller. Pluriel de aise.

Where the eye mixes ailles and aises

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. ailles runs 6 letters (VVCCVC) against aises's 5 (VVCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

6 ch
ailles
5 ch
aises

Why the eye confuses ailles with aises

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: ailles is \aj\ while aises is \ɛz\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (verb vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 66828, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

ailles is recorded at frequency rank #25,192, classified as averb, pronounced \aj\. aises is at rank #41,636, tagged as anoun, pronounced \ɛz\.

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 66828, this pair ranks #66,078 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of ailles vs aises

Shared letters: aeis. Private to "ailles": l. Private to "aises": -.

"ailles" · 6 letters · shape VVCCVC  ·  "aises" · 5 letters · shape VVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • ailles ← ailels · ailless · aillse · aliles · ialles
  • aises ← aisess · aisse · aisses · asies · iases

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "ailles" for "aises" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "ailles" is a verb and "aises" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary French text, does "ailles" or "aises" show up more?
"ailles" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #25,192 in our French list, against #41,636 for "aises". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.

  • Full dictionary entry for "ailles" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "aises" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #66,078 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "ailles" and "aises" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "aises 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 #66,078 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