Which to use
“dos” and “drop” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #961
- “dos” frequency rank
- #16,859
- “drop” frequency rank
- 17820
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | dos | drop |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Partie du corps humain située au-dessus du postérieur, depuis le cou jusqu’aux reins. | Coup de pied en demi-volée par lequel un joueur de rugby tente d’envoyer le ballon par-dessus la barre horizontale du but de l’équipe adverse. |
Where the eye mixes dos and drop
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.
Visual trap between dos and drop
A purely visual mix-up. dos (\do\) and drop (\dʁɔp\) 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 17820, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
dos is recorded at frequency rank #961, classified as anoun, pronounced \do\. drop is at rank #16,859, tagged as anoun, pronounced \dʁɔp\.
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 17820, this pair ranks #381,322 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of dos vs drop
Shared letters: do. Private to "dos": s. Private to "drop": pr.
"dos" · 3 letters · shape CVC · "drop" · 4 letters · shape CCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
- drop ← ddrop · dorp · dropp · drpo · drrop · rdop
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "dos" for "drop" ever safe?
In ordinary French text, does "dos" or "drop" show up more?
Useful next steps
Eye-level mix-up between "dos" and "drop" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.
- Full dictionary entry for "dos" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "drop" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #381,322 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "dos" and "drop" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "dray vs drop". 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 #381,322 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.