Which to use
“bison” and “bisons” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #24,129
- “bison” frequency rank
- #34,896
- “bisons” frequency rank
- 59025
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | bison | bisons |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Grand bovidé (du genre Bison) existant en Amérique (Bison bison) et en Europe (Bison bonasus). | Pluriel de bison. |
Same sound, different letters: bison vs bisons
Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 5 letters.
Ear matches; page differs - bison and bisons
This is the hard kind. bison and bisons are pronounced identically (\bi.zɔ̃\) and both work as anoun. 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 extra letter(s) - “bison” sits inside “bisons”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 59025, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
bison is recorded at frequency rank #24,129, classified as anoun, pronounced \bi.zɔ̃\. bisons is at rank #34,896, tagged as anoun, pronounced \bi.zɔ̃\.
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 59025, this pair ranks #105,523 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of bison vs bisons
Shared letters: binos. Private to "bison": -. Private to "bisons": -.
"bison" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC · "bisons" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "bison" for "bisons" ever safe?
Frequency check: "bison" vs "bisons" - which ranks higher?
After this comparison
"bison" and "bisons" share a sound, keep the gloss open, then jump to the headword or a nearby trap.
- Full dictionary entry for "bison" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "bisons" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #105,523 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "bison" and "bisons" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "bisons vs boson". 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 #105,523 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.