Which to use
“faille” is a noun and “fill” is an adverb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #6,087
- “faille” frequency rank
- #38,807
- “fill” frequency rank
- 44894
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | faille | fill |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Fracture, fissure avec rejet des deux blocs situés de part et d’autre de la cassure. | Aussitôt, immédiatement, sitôt, tout de suite, d’abord. |
Where the eye mixes faille and fill
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence.
Why the eye confuses faille with fill
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: faille is \faj\ while fill is \ˈfiɫ\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 2 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs adverb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 44894, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
faille is recorded at frequency rank #6,087, classified as anoun, pronounced \faj\. fill is at rank #38,807, tagged as anadv, pronounced \ˈfiɫ\.
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 44894, this pair ranks #206,996 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of faille vs fill
Shared letters: fil. Private to "faille": ae. Private to "fill": -.
"faille" · 6 letters · shape CVVCCV · "fill" · 4 letters · shape CVCC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "faille" and "fill" mean the same thing in a sentence?
In ordinary French text, does "faille" or "fill" show up more?
What to do next
Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.
- Full dictionary entry for "faille" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "fill" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #206,996 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "faille" and "fill" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "filez vs fill". 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 #206,996 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.