artivsathTell them apart

Quick tell: arti is a noun, ath is an article, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“arti” is a noun and “ath” is an article - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#49,494
“arti” frequency rank
#31,830
“ath” frequency rank
81324
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature arti ath
Definition Métier. Contraction de la préposition a et de l'article défini eth.

Where the eye mixes arti and ath

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence. arti runs 4 letters (VCCV) against ath's 3 (VCC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

4 ch
arti
3 ch
ath

Look-alike desk: arti vs ath

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: arti is \ˈar.ti\ while ath is \at\. 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 (noun vs article), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 81324, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

arti is recorded at frequency rank #49,494, classified as anoun, pronounced \ˈar.ti\. ath is at rank #31,830, tagged as anarticle, pronounced \at\.

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 81324, this pair ranks #18,994 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of arti vs ath

Shared letters: at. Private to "arti": ir. Private to "ath": h.

"arti" · 4 letters · shape VCCV  ·  "ath" · 3 letters · shape VCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • arti ← arit · arrti · artti · rati

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "arti" for "ath" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "arti" is a noun and "ath" an article, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "arti" vs "ath" - which ranks higher?
"ath" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #31,830 in our French list, against #49,494 for "arti". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "arti" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "ath" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #18,994 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "arti" and "ath" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "arti vs aru". 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 #18,994 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