Which to use
“civile” is a noun and “civils” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #1,731
- “civile” frequency rank
- #3,828
- “civils” frequency rank
- 5559
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | civile | civils |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Personne de la population qui n’a pas le statut de combattante et qui n’est ni une prisonnière de guerre, ni une combattante ne prenant plus part aux hostilités (blessée, naufragée, malade, etc). | Masculin pluriel de civil. |
Same sound, different letters: civile vs civils
Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 5 letters. civile (CVCVCV) and civils (CVCVCC) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.
Ear matches; page differs - civile and civils
Say them out loud and nothing separates them: civile and civils carry the same recorded pronunciation, \si.vil\. Grammar is what tells them apart: one is anoun, the other anadjective, so most sentences will only accept one of them. They differ by a single letter - e in “civile” becomes s in “civils”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 5559, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
civile is recorded at frequency rank #1,731, classified as anoun, pronounced \si.vil\. civils is at rank #3,828, tagged as anadj, pronounced \si.vil\.
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 5559, this pair ranks #428,677 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of civile vs civils
Shared letters: cilv. Private to "civile": e. Private to "civils": s.
"civile" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCV · "civils" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "civile" and "civils" mean the same thing in a sentence?
Which is more common, "civile" or "civils"?
After this comparison
"civile" and "civils" share a sound, keep the gloss open, then jump to the headword or a nearby trap.
- Full dictionary entry for "civile" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "civils" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #428,677 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "civile" and "civils" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "civils vs civitas". 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 #428,677 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.