démêlés vs Demers, What's the Difference?

Which to use

“démêlés” is an adjective and “Demers” is a name - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#30,137
“démêlés” frequency rank: #42,818
“Demers” frequency rank: 72955
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature	démêlés	Demers
Definition	Masculin pluriel de démêlé.	Nom de famille.

Where the spellings diverge

Shared letters are muted; the letters that actually set démêlés and Demers apart are highlighted. They share 3 letters in sequence, which is exactly why the eye skips the difference.

7 ch

démêlés

6 ch

Demers

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: démêlés is \de.me.le\ while Demers is \də.mɛʁs\. 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 (adjective vs name), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 72955, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

démêlés is recorded at frequency rank #30,137, classified as anadj, pronounced \de.me.le\. Demers is at rank #42,818, tagged as aname, pronounced \də.mɛʁs\.

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 72955, this pair ranks #42,215 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of démêlés vs Demers

Shared letters: dms. Private to "démêlés": léê. Private to "Demers": er.

"démêlés" · 7 letters · shape CVCVCVC · "Demers" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

Demers ← ddemers · deemrs · demerrs · demerss · demesr · demmers · demres · dmeers

Frequency comparison

démêlés#30,137

Demers#42,818

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "démêlés" and "Demers" be used interchangeably?

No - they are not even the same part of speech. "démêlés" is an adjective and "Demers" a name, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.

Which is more common, "démêlés" or "Demers"?

"démêlés" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #30,137 in our French list, against #42,818 for "Demers". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Remembering démêlés vs Demers

The fastest way to pick the right one every time.

Check the role first: if you need an adjective, it's “démêlés”; for a name, it's “Demers”.
See each word in full, definition, IPA, etymology and its other confusables. Full “démêlés” entry
Browse more pairs most likely to be confused. Most confusable