émetvseyeWhat's the difference?

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

Which to use

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

#9,947
“émet” frequency rank
#15,623
“eye” frequency rank
25570
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature émet eye
Definition Troisième personne du singulier de l’indicatif présent de émettre. Œil mais aussi œil d'une pomme de terre, d'un cyclone.

Where the eye mixes émet and eye

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 1 letter in sequence.

4 ch
émet
3 ch
eye

Visual trap between émet and eye

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: émet is \e.mɛ\ while eye is \ˈaɪ\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (verb vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 25570, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

émet is recorded at frequency rank #9,947, classified as averb, pronounced \e.mɛ\. eye is at rank #15,623, tagged as anoun, pronounced \ˈaɪ\.

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 25570, this pair ranks #340,101 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of émet vs eye

Shared letters: e. Private to "émet": mté. Private to "eye": y.

"émet" · 4 letters · shape VCVC  ·  "eye" · 3 letters · shape VVV

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "émet" and "eye" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "émet" is a verb and "eye" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary French text, does "émet" or "eye" show up more?
"émet" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #9,947 in our French list, against #15,623 for "eye". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.

  • Full dictionary entry for "émet" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "eye" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #340,101 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "émet" and "eye" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "EPO vs eye". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #340,101 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