Which to use
“canine” is a noun and “canines” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #30,931
- “canine” frequency rank
- #36,745
- “canines” frequency rank
- 67676
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | canine | canines |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Dent pointue d’un mammifère (excepté les rongeurs), au nombre de deux par mâchoire, qui sert principalement à rompre ou à briser les corps durs ainsi qu'à déchirer la chair, et qui se situe entre les incisives et les molaires. | Féminin pluriel de canin. |
Same sound, different letters: canine vs canines
Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 6 letters. canine runs 6 letters (CVCVCV) against canines's 7 (CVCVCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Ear matches; page differs - canine and canines
Say them out loud and nothing separates them: canine and canines carry the same recorded pronunciation, \ka.nin\. Grammar is what tells them apart: one is anoun, the other anadjective, so most sentences will only accept one of them. They differ by 1 extra letter(s) - “canine” sits inside “canines”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 67676, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
canine is recorded at frequency rank #30,931, classified as anoun, pronounced \ka.nin\. canines is at rank #36,745, tagged as anadj, pronounced \ka.nin\.
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 67676, this pair ranks #62,371 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of canine vs canines
Shared letters: acein. Private to "canine": -. Private to "canines": s.
"canine" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCV · "canines" · 7 letters · shape CVCVCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Can "canine" and "canines" be used interchangeably?
Which is more common, "canine" or "canines"?
After this comparison
"canine" and "canines" share a sound, keep the gloss open, then jump to the headword or a nearby trap.
- Full dictionary entry for "canine" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "canines" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #62,371 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "canine" and "canines" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "canines vs Cannet". 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 #62,371 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.