Which to use
“balai” and “barak” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #15,809
- “balai” frequency rank
- #46,018
- “barak” frequency rank
- 61827
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | balai | barak |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Outil fait d’un faisceau souple, composé de fibres végétales ou synthétiques, ou d’une brosse, fixée au bout d’un long manche et destiné à nettoyer les poussières et déchets tombés au sol. | Synonyme de chien courant de Bosnie à poil dur (race de chien). |
Where the eye mixes balai and barak
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. balai (CVCVV) and barak (CVCVC) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.
Why the eye confuses balai with barak
A purely visual mix-up. balai (\ba.lɛ\) and barak (\ba.ʁak\) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 61827, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
balai is recorded at frequency rank #15,809, classified as anoun, pronounced \ba.lɛ\. barak is at rank #46,018, tagged as anoun, pronounced \ba.ʁak\.
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 61827, this pair ranks #90,209 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of balai vs barak
Shared letters: ab. Private to "balai": il. Private to "barak": kr.
"balai" · 5 letters · shape CVCVV · "barak" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Can "balai" and "barak" be used interchangeably?
Which is more common, "balai" or "barak"?
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 "balai" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "barak" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #90,209 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "balai" and "barak" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "bafa vs barak". 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 #90,209 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.