bansvsbusWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#36,719
“bans” frequency rank
#1,508
“bus” frequency rank
38227
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature bans bus
Definition Pluriel de ban. Véhicule de transport en commun routier pouvant transporter plusieurs dizaines de passagers.

Where the eye mixes bans and bus

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.

4 ch
bans
3 ch
bus

Visual trap between bans and bus

A purely visual mix-up. bans (\bɑ̃\) and bus (\bys\) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 38227, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

bans is recorded at frequency rank #36,719, classified as anoun, pronounced \bɑ̃\. bus is at rank #1,508, tagged as anoun, pronounced \bys\.

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 38227, this pair ranks #256,771 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of bans vs bus

Shared letters: bs. Private to "bans": an. Private to "bus": u.

"bans" · 4 letters · shape CVCC  ·  "bus" · 3 letters · shape CVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • bansabns · banns · banss · basn · bbans · bnas

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "bans" and "bus" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\bɑ̃\ versus \bys\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "bans" or "bus"?
"bus" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #1,508 in our French list, against #36,719 for "bans". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

After this comparison

Eye-level mix-up between "bans" and "bus" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "bans" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "bus" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #256,771 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "bans" and "bus" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "banals vs bans". 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 #256,771 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