écrisvsétuisWhat's the difference?

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

Which to use

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

#3,886
“écris” frequency rank
#47,703
“étuis” frequency rank
51589
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature écris étuis
Definition Première personne du singulier de l’indicatif présent de écrire. Pluriel de étui.

Where the eye mixes écris and étuis

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.

5 ch
écris
5 ch
étuis

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: écris is \e.kʁi\ while étuis is \e.tɥi\. 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 51589, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

écris is recorded at frequency rank #3,886, classified as averb, pronounced \e.kʁi\. étuis is at rank #47,703, tagged as anoun, pronounced \e.tɥi\.

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 51589, this pair ranks #153,893 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of écris vs étuis

Shared letters: isé. Private to "écris": cr. Private to "étuis": tu.

"écris" · 5 letters · shape VCCVC  ·  "étuis" · 5 letters · shape VCVVC

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "écris" and "étuis" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "écris" is a verb and "étuis" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "écris" or "étuis"?
"écris" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #3,886 in our French list, against #47,703 for "étuis". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list