facesvsfaçonsWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#10,157
“faces” frequency rank
#4,422
“façons” frequency rank
14579
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature faces façons
Definition Pluriel de face. Pluriel de façon.

Where the eye mixes faces and façons

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. faces runs 5 letters (CVCVC) against façons's 6 (CVCVCC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

5 ch
faces
6 ch
façons

Why the eye confuses faces with façons

A purely visual mix-up. faces (\fas\) and façons (\fa.sɔ̃\) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 14579, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

faces is recorded at frequency rank #10,157, classified as anoun, pronounced \fas\. façons is at rank #4,422, tagged as anoun, pronounced \fa.sɔ̃\.

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 14579, this pair ranks #396,061 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of faces vs façons

Shared letters: afs. Private to "faces": ce. Private to "façons": noç.

"faces" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC  ·  "façons" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • faces ← afces · facces · facess · facse · faecs · fcaes · ffaces

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "faces" and "façons" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\fas\ versus \fa.sɔ̃\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "faces" vs "façons" - which ranks higher?
"façons" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #4,422 in our French list, against #10,157 for "faces". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "faces" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "façons" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #396,061 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "faces" and "façons" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "faces vs fakes". 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 #396,061 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