écusvsétuiWhat's the difference?

Which to use

“écus” and “étui” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#33,086
“écus” frequency rank
#20,902
“étui” frequency rank
53988
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature écus étui
Definition Pluriel de écu. Contenant pour mettre, porter ou conserver un objet, et dont la forme varie selon les objets.

Where the eye mixes écus and étui

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.

4 ch
écus
4 ch
étui

Visual trap between écus and étui

A purely visual mix-up. écus (\e.ky\) and étui (\e.tɥi\) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 53988, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

écus is recorded at frequency rank #33,086, classified as anoun, pronounced \e.ky\. étui is at rank #20,902, 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 53988, this pair ranks #137,052 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of écus vs étui

Shared letters: . Private to "écus": cs. Private to "étui": it.

"écus" · 4 letters · shape VCVC  ·  "étui" · 4 letters · shape VCVV

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "écus" and "étui" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\e.ky\ versus \e.tɥi\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "écus" vs "étui" - which ranks higher?
"étui" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #20,902 in our French list, against #33,086 for "écus". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Eye-level mix-up between "écus" and "étui" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "écus" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "étui" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #137,052 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "écus" and "étui" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "écus vs étuis". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #137,052 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list