Which to use
“failles” is a noun and “faires” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #12,382
- “failles” frequency rank
- #46,749
- “faires” frequency rank
- 59131
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | failles | faires |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Pluriel de faille. | Accusatif neutre singulier de la déclinaison forte de fair. |
Where the eye mixes failles and faires
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence. failles runs 7 letters (CVVCCVC) against faires's 6 (CVVCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Look-alike desk: failles vs faires
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: failles is \faj\ while faires is \ˈfɛːʁəs\. 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 59131, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
failles is recorded at frequency rank #12,382, classified as anoun, pronounced \faj\. faires is at rank #46,749, tagged as anadj, pronounced \ˈfɛːʁəs\.
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 59131, this pair ranks #104,901 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of failles vs faires
Shared letters: aefis. Private to "failles": l. Private to "faires": r.
"failles" · 7 letters · shape CVVCCVC · "faires" · 6 letters · shape CVVCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "failles" and "faires" mean the same thing in a sentence?
Which is more common, "failles" or "faires"?
What to do next
Eye-level mix-up between "failles" and "faires" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.
- Full dictionary entry for "failles" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "faires" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #104,901 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "failles" and "faires" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "faires 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 #104,901 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.