décidesvsdruidesTell them apart

Quick tell: décides is a verb, druides is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“décides” is a verb and “druides” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#18,995
“décides” frequency rank
#37,766
“druides” frequency rank
56761
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature décides druides
Definition Deuxième personne du singulier de l’indicatif présent de décider. Pluriel de druide.

Where the eye mixes décides and druides

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

7 ch
décides
7 ch
druides

Why the eye confuses décides with druides

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: décides is \de.sid\ while druides is \dʁɥid\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (verb vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 56761, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

décides is recorded at frequency rank #18,995, classified as averb, pronounced \de.sid\. druides is at rank #37,766, tagged as anoun, pronounced \dʁɥid\.

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 56761, this pair ranks #119,085 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of décides vs druides

Shared letters: deis. Private to "décides": . Private to "druides": ru.

"décides" · 7 letters · shape CVCVCVC  ·  "druides" · 7 letters · shape CCVVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • druidesddruides · driudes · drruides · drudies · druiddes · druidess · druidse · druieds

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "décides" and "druides" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "décides" is a verb and "druides" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary French text, does "décides" or "druides" show up more?
"décides" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #18,995 in our French list, against #37,766 for "druides". 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 "décides" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "druides" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #119,085 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "décides" and "druides" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "druide vs druides". 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 #119,085 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