claironvsclairsWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: clairon is a noun, clairs is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“clairon” is a noun and “clairs” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#38,705
“clairon” frequency rank
#8,820
“clairs” frequency rank
47525
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature clairon clairs
Definition Sorte de trompette sans piston, utilisée dans les sonneries militaires. Masculin pluriel de clair.

Where the eye mixes clairon and clairs

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence.

7 ch
clairon
6 ch
clairs

Look-alike desk: clairon vs clairs

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: clairon is \klɛ.ʁɔ̃\ while clairs is \klɛʁ\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 47525, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

clairon is recorded at frequency rank #38,705, classified as anoun, pronounced \klɛ.ʁɔ̃\. 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 47525, this pair ranks #186,280 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of clairon vs clairs

Shared letters: acilr. Private to "clairon": no. Private to "clairs": s.

"clairon" · 7 letters · shape CCVVCVC  ·  "clairs" · 6 letters · shape CCVVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • claironcaliron · cclairon · claiorn · clairno · claironn · clairron · clarion · cliaron
  • clairscalirs · cclairs · clairrs · clairss · claisr · claris · cliars · cllairs

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "clairon" and "clairs" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "clairon" is a noun and "clairs" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "clairon" or "clairs"?
"clairs" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #8,820 in our French list, against #38,705 for "clairon". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.

  • Full dictionary entry for "clairon" 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 #186,280 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "clairon" and "clairs" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "chiron vs clairon". 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 #186,280 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list