banalesvsbanalsConfusable pair

Which to use

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

#31,837
“banales” frequency rank
#48,936
“banals” frequency rank
80773
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature banales banals
Definition Féminin pluriel de banal. Masculin pluriel de banal (commun, très employé).

Same sound, different letters: banales vs banals

Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 6 letters.

7 ch
banales
6 ch
banals

Homophone desk: banales vs banals

This is the hard kind. banales and banals are pronounced identically (\ba.nal\) and both work as anadjective. Neither the ear nor the grammar will rescue you; only the meaning does, so the glosses below are the whole decision. They differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 80773, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

banales is recorded at frequency rank #31,837, classified as anadj, pronounced \ba.nal\. banals is at rank #48,936, tagged as anadj, pronounced \ba.nal\.

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 80773, this pair ranks #20,176 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of banales vs banals

Shared letters: ablns. Private to "banales": e. Private to "banals": -.

"banales" · 7 letters · shape CVCVCVC  ·  "banals" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • banalesabnales · baanles · banaels · banaless · banalles · banalse · banlaes · bannales
  • banalsabnals · baanls · banalls · banalss · banasl · banlas · bannals · bbanals

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "banales" and "banals" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are pronounced the same (\ba.nal\), which is exactly why they get swapped in writing, but the dictionary meanings above are different, and pronunciation is no guide here.
Frequency check: "banales" vs "banals" - which ranks higher?
"banales" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #31,837 in our French list, against #48,936 for "banals". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

You've separated the homophone pair "banales" / "banals". Follow the links when you need the full entry or a neighbour that trips the same ear.

  • Full dictionary entry for "banales" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "banals" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #20,176 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "banales" and "banals" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "banals vs banyuls". 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 #20,176 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