Which to use
“elle” is a pronoun and “els” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #41
- “elle” frequency rank
- #33,668
- “els” frequency rank
- 33709
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | elle | els |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Pronom clitique de la troisième personne du singulier féminin sujet. | Pluriel de el. |
Same sound, different letters: elle vs els
Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 2 letters.
Homophone desk: elle vs els
Say them out loud and nothing separates them: elle and els carry the same recorded pronunciation, \ɛl\. Grammar is what tells them apart: one is apronoun, the other anoun, so most sentences will only accept one of them. They differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 33709, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
elle is recorded at frequency rank #41, classified as apron, pronounced \ɛl\. els is at rank #33,668, tagged as anoun, pronounced \ɛl\.
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 33709, this pair ranks #288,826 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of elle vs els
Shared letters: el. Private to "elle": -. Private to "els": s.
"elle" · 4 letters · shape VCCV · "els" · 3 letters · shape VCC
Known mistypes of this pair
- elle ← elel · lele
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "elle" and "els" mean the same thing in a sentence?
In ordinary French text, does "elle" or "els" show up more?
After this comparison
"elle" and "els" share a sound, keep the gloss open, then jump to the headword or a nearby trap.
- Full dictionary entry for "elle" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "els" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #288,826 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "elle" and "els" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "els vs EPO". 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 #288,826 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.