bihanvsbirmanWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#48,363
“bihan” frequency rank
#44,332
“birman” frequency rank
92695
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature bihan birman
Definition Petit. Relatif aux Birmans, à la Birmanie (Myanmar), son peuple, sa langue ou sa culture.

Where the eye mixes bihan and birman

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. bihan runs 5 letters (CVCVC) against birman's 6 (CVCCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

5 ch
bihan
6 ch
birman

Visual trap between bihan and birman

A purely visual mix-up. bihan (\ˈbi(h)ː.ãn\) and birman (\biʁ.mɑ̃\) 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 92695, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

bihan is recorded at frequency rank #48,363, classified as anadj, pronounced \ˈbi(h)ː.ãn\. birman is at rank #44,332, tagged as anadj, pronounced \biʁ.mɑ̃\.

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 92695, this pair ranks #2,813 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of bihan vs birman

Shared letters: abin. Private to "bihan": h. Private to "birman": mr.

"bihan" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC  ·  "birman" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • bihan ← bbihan · bhian · biahn · bihann · bihhan · bihna · ibhan
  • birman ← bbirman · bimran · biramn · birmann · birmman · birmna · birrman · briman

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "bihan" and "birman" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\ˈbi(h)ː.ãn\ versus \biʁ.mɑ̃\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "bihan" vs "birman" - which ranks higher?
"birman" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #44,332 in our French list, against #48,363 for "bihan". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "bihan" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "birman" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #2,813 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "bihan" and "birman" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "bihan vs busan". 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 #2,813 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