éoliennevséoliensWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: éolienne is a noun, éoliens is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“éolienne” is a noun and “éoliens” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#17,048
“éolienne” frequency rank
#42,130
“éoliens” frequency rank
59178
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature éolienne éoliens
Definition Turbine mue par le vent. Masculin pluriel de l’adjectif éolien.

Where the eye mixes éolienne and éoliens

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 6 letters in sequence. éolienne runs 8 letters (VVCVVCCV) against éoliens's 7 (VVCVVCC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

8 ch
éolienne
7 ch
éoliens

Visual trap between éolienne and éoliens

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: éolienne is \e.ɔ.ljɛn\ while éoliens is \e.ɔ.ljɛ̃\. 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 (noun vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 59178, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

éolienne is recorded at frequency rank #17,048, classified as anoun, pronounced \e.ɔ.ljɛn\. éoliens is at rank #42,130, tagged as anadj, pronounced \e.ɔ.ljɛ̃\.

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 59178, this pair ranks #104,620 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of éolienne vs éoliens

Shared letters: eilnoé. Private to "éolienne": -. Private to "éoliens": s.

"éolienne" · 8 letters · shape VVCVVCCV  ·  "éoliens" · 7 letters · shape VVCVVCC

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "éolienne" for "éoliens" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "éolienne" is a noun and "éoliens" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "éolienne" vs "éoliens" - which ranks higher?
"éolienne" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #17,048 in our French list, against #42,130 for "éoliens". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "éolienne" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "éoliens" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #104,620 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "éolienne" and "éoliens" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "écoliers vs éoliens". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #104,620 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