Which to use
“foies” and “fouets” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #47,901
- “foies” frequency rank
- #49,094
- “fouets” frequency rank
- 96995
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | foies | fouets |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Pluriel de foie. | Pluriel de fouet. |
Where the eye mixes foies and fouets
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. foies runs 5 letters (CVVVC) against fouets's 6 (CVVVCC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Look-alike desk: foies vs fouets
A purely visual mix-up. foies (\fwa\) and fouets (\fwɛ\) 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 96995, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
foies is recorded at frequency rank #47,901, classified as anoun, pronounced \fwa\. fouets is at rank #49,094, tagged as anoun, pronounced \fwɛ\.
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 96995, this pair ranks #485 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of foies vs fouets
Shared letters: efos. Private to "foies": i. Private to "fouets": tu.
"foies" · 5 letters · shape CVVVC · "fouets" · 6 letters · shape CVVVCC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "foies" for "fouets" ever safe?
Frequency check: "foies" vs "fouets" - which ranks higher?
Useful next steps
Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.
- Full dictionary entry for "foies" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "fouets" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #485 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "foies" and "fouets" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "foies vs foins". 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 #485 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.