Which to use
“drain” is a noun and “drainer” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #33,222
- “drain” frequency rank
- #38,758
- “drainer” frequency rank
- 71980
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | drain | drainer |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Une des trois électrodes d’un transistor à effet de champ (les deux autres sont appelées source et grille). Il joue un rôle analogue à l’anode dans les tubes à vide, ou le collecteur dans les transistors bipolaires. | Débarrasser un terrain de l’excès d’humidité au moyen de drains ou de canaux de drainage. |
Where the eye mixes drain and drainer
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence.
Why the eye confuses drain with drainer
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: drain is \dʁɛ̃\ while drainer is \dʁe.ne\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 2 extra letter(s) - “drain” sits inside “drainer”, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 71980, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
drain is recorded at frequency rank #33,222, classified as anoun, pronounced \dʁɛ̃\. drainer is at rank #38,758, tagged as averb, pronounced \dʁe.ne\.
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 71980, this pair ranks #45,621 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of drain vs drainer
Shared letters: adinr. Private to "drain": -. Private to "drainer": e.
"drain" · 5 letters · shape CCVVC · "drainer" · 7 letters · shape CCVVCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "drain" and "drainer" mean the same thing in a sentence?
Frequency check: "drain" vs "drainer" - which ranks higher?
What to do next
Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.
- Full dictionary entry for "drain" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "drainer" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #45,621 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "drain" and "drainer" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "draine vs drainer". 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 #45,621 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.