Which to use
“ferais” is a verb and “forain” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #3,534
- “ferais” frequency rank
- #40,770
- “forain” frequency rank
- 44304
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | ferais | forain |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Première personne du singulier du conditionnel de faire. | Qui n’est pas du lieu, étranger. |
Where the eye mixes ferais and forain
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. ferais and forain follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCVVC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.
Look-alike desk: ferais vs forain
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: ferais is \fə.ʁɛ\ while forain is \fɔ.ʁɛ̃\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (verb vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 44304, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
ferais is recorded at frequency rank #3,534, classified as averb, pronounced \fə.ʁɛ\. forain is at rank #40,770, tagged as anadj, pronounced \fɔ.ʁɛ̃\.
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 44304, this pair ranks #211,475 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of ferais vs forain
Shared letters: afir. Private to "ferais": es. Private to "forain": no.
"ferais" · 6 letters · shape CVCVVC · "forain" · 6 letters · shape CVCVVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "ferais" for "forain" ever safe?
Frequency check: "ferais" vs "forain" - which ranks higher?
After this comparison
Eye-level mix-up between "ferais" and "forain" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.
- Full dictionary entry for "ferais" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "forain" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #211,475 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "ferais" and "forain" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "forain vs forman". 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 #211,475 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.