Which to use
“ballot” and “billon” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #33,564
- “ballot” frequency rank
- #41,675
- “billon” frequency rank
- 75239
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | ballot | billon |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Petite balle de marchandises. | Pièce de bois de sapin équarrie, billot. |
Where the eye mixes ballot and billon
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. ballot and billon follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCCVC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.
Visual trap between ballot and billon
A purely visual mix-up. ballot (\ba.lo\) and billon (\bi.jɔ̃\) 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 75239, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
ballot is recorded at frequency rank #33,564, classified as anoun, pronounced \ba.lo\. billon is at rank #41,675, tagged as anoun, pronounced \bi.jɔ̃\.
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 75239, this pair ranks #34,670 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of ballot vs billon
Shared letters: blo. Private to "ballot": at. Private to "billon": in.
"ballot" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC · "billon" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Can "ballot" and "billon" be used interchangeably?
Which is more common, "ballot" or "billon"?
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 "ballot" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "billon" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #34,670 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "ballot" and "billon" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "billion vs billon". 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 #34,670 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.