flopvsfooConfusable pair

Which to use

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

#19,838
“flop” frequency rank
#43,447
“foo” frequency rank
63285
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature flop foo
Definition Échec, en particulier d’œuvre artistique ou d’entreprise commerciale. Variable métasyntaxique en programmation informatique.

Where the eye mixes flop and foo

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.

4 ch
flop
3 ch
foo

Look-alike desk: flop vs foo

A purely visual mix-up. flop (\flɔp\) and foo (\fu\) 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 63285, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

flop is recorded at frequency rank #19,838, classified as anoun, pronounced \flɔp\. foo is at rank #43,447, tagged as anoun, pronounced \fu\.

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 63285, this pair ranks #82,757 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of flop vs foo

Shared letters: fo. Private to "flop": lp. Private to "foo": -.

"flop" · 4 letters · shape CCVC  ·  "foo" · 3 letters · shape CVV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • flopfflop · fllop · flopp · flpo · folp · lfop

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "flop" and "foo" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\flɔp\ versus \fu\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "flop" or "foo"?
"flop" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #19,838 in our French list, against #43,447 for "foo". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

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 "flop" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "foo" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #82,757 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "flop" and "foo" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Fee vs foo". 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 #82,757 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