cei vs cy, What's the Difference?

Which to use

“cei” is an article and “cy” is an adverb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#31,876
“cei” frequency rank: #27,395
“cy” frequency rank: 59271
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature	cei	cy
Definition	Article adjectival (ou démonstratif) nominatif et accusatif masculin pluriel, généralement traduit par « les ».	Ci.

Letter map: cei vs cy

Shared letters muted; letters that set cei and cy apart highlighted. Shared run: 1.

3 ch

cei

2 ch

Role in the sentence - cei and cy

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: cei is anarticle and cyanadverb. On the page they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 59271, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

cei is recorded at frequency rank #31,876, classified as anarticle. cy is at rank #27,395, tagged as anadv.

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 59271, this pair ranks #104,112 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of cei vs cy

Shared letters: c. Private to "cei": ei. Private to "cy": y.

"cei" · 3 letters · shape CVV · "cy" · 2 letters · shape CV

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "cei" for "cy" ever safe?

No - they are not even the same part of speech. "cei" is an article and "cy" an adverb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.

In ordinary French text, does "cei" or "cy" show up more?

"cy" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #27,395 in our French list, against #31,876 for "cei". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "cei" and "cy".

Full dictionary entry for "cei" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
Full dictionary entry for "cy" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
This pair ranks #104,112 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
"cei" and "cy" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "CCE vs cei". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #104,112 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.