exemptvsexemptsTell them apart

Which to use

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

#25,647
“exempt” frequency rank
#39,792
“exempts” frequency rank
65439
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature exempt exempts
Definition Qui par droit, par privilège, par nature, n’est pas sujet à quelque chose ; qui n’est pas assujetti à quelque chose. Masculin pluriel de exempt.

Same sound, different letters: exempt vs exempts

Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 6 letters.

6 ch
exempt
7 ch
exempts

Homophone desk: exempt vs exempts

This is the hard kind. exempt and exempts are pronounced identically (\ɛɡ.zɑ̃\) and both work as anadjective. Neither the ear nor the grammar will rescue you; only the meaning does, so the glosses below are the whole decision. They differ by 1 extra letter(s) - “exempt” sits inside “exempts”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 65439, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

exempt is recorded at frequency rank #25,647, classified as anadj, pronounced \ɛɡ.zɑ̃\. exempts is at rank #39,792, tagged as anadj, pronounced \ɛɡ.zɑ̃\.

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 65439, this pair ranks #72,330 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of exempt vs exempts

Shared letters: emptx. Private to "exempt": -. Private to "exempts": s.

"exempt" · 6 letters · shape VCVCCC  ·  "exempts" · 7 letters · shape VCVCCCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • exempteexmpt · exemmpt · exemppt · exemptt · exemtp · exepmt · exmept · exxempt
  • exemptseexmpts · exemmpts · exemppts · exempst · exemptss · exemptts · exemtps · exepmts

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "exempt" and "exempts" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are pronounced the same (\ɛɡ.zɑ̃\), which is exactly why they get swapped in writing, but the dictionary meanings above are different, and pronunciation is no guide here.
Frequency check: "exempt" vs "exempts" - which ranks higher?
"exempt" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #25,647 in our French list, against #39,792 for "exempts". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

You've separated the homophone pair "exempt" / "exempts". Follow the links when you need the full entry or a neighbour that trips the same ear.

  • Full dictionary entry for "exempt" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "exempts" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #72,330 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "exempt" and "exempts" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "exemptés vs exempts". 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 #72,330 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