Which to use
“clair” and “clairs” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #1,086
- “clair” frequency rank
- #8,820
- “clairs” frequency rank
- 9906
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | clair | clairs |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Qui a l’éclat du jour, de la lumière. | Masculin pluriel de clair. |
Same sound, different letters: clair vs clairs
Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 5 letters.
Ear matches; page differs - clair and clairs
This is the hard kind. clair and clairs are pronounced identically (\klɛʁ\) and both work as anadjective. 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) - “clair” sits inside “clairs”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 9906, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
clair is recorded at frequency rank #1,086, classified as anadj, pronounced \klɛʁ\. clairs is at rank #8,820, tagged as anadj, pronounced \klɛʁ\.
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 9906, this pair ranks #414,974 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of clair vs clairs
Shared letters: acilr. Private to "clair": -. Private to "clairs": s.
"clair" · 5 letters · shape CCVVC · "clairs" · 6 letters · shape CCVVCC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "clair" and "clairs" mean the same thing in a sentence?
In ordinary French text, does "clair" or "clairs" show up more?
Useful next steps
Sound matches; spelling doesn't. Use the exits below to lock the right form or check a cousin pair.
- Full dictionary entry for "clair" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "clairs" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #414,974 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "clair" and "clairs" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "caïds vs clairs". 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 #414,974 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.