Which to use
“délires” and “desire” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #13,161
- “délires” frequency rank
- #28,129
- “desire” frequency rank
- 41290
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | délires | desire |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Pluriel de délire. | Désir (1, 2, 3), souhait, volonté. |
Where the eye mixes délires and desire
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. délires runs 7 letters (CVCVCVC) against desire's 6 (CVCVCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Look-alike desk: délires vs desire
A purely visual mix-up. délires (\de.liʁ\) and desire (\dɪ.ˈzaɪ.əʳ\) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 41290, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
délires is recorded at frequency rank #13,161, classified as anoun, pronounced \de.liʁ\. desire is at rank #28,129, tagged as anoun, pronounced \dɪ.ˈzaɪ.əʳ\.
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 41290, this pair ranks #234,200 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of délires vs desire
Shared letters: deirs. Private to "délires": lé. Private to "desire": -.
"délires" · 7 letters · shape CVCVCVC · "desire" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCV
Known mistypes of this pair
- desire ← ddesire · deisre · desier · desirre · desrie · dessire · dseire · edsire
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "délires" and "desire" mean the same thing in a sentence?
Which is more common, "délires" or "desire"?
Useful next steps
Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.
- Full dictionary entry for "délires" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "desire" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #234,200 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "délires" and "desire" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "desire vs désirées". 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 #234,200 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.