fondusvsfonsWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: fondus is a verb, fons is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“fondus” is a verb and “fons” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#31,499
“fondus” frequency rank
#43,445
“fons” frequency rank
74944
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature fondus fons
Definition Participe passé masculin pluriel du verbe fondre. Fonds (patrimoine).

Letter map: fondus vs fons

Shared letters muted; letters that set fondus and fons apart highlighted. Shared run: 4. fondus runs 6 letters (CVCCVC) against fons's 4 (CVCC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

6 ch
fondus
4 ch
fons

Grammar separator: fondus vs fons

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: fondus is averb and fonsanoun. On the page they differ by 2 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 74944, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

fondus is recorded at frequency rank #31,499, classified as averb, pronounced \fɔ̃.dy\. fons is at rank #43,445, tagged as anoun.

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 74944, this pair ranks #35,556 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of fondus vs fons

Shared letters: fnos. Private to "fondus": du. Private to "fons": -.

"fondus" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC  ·  "fons" · 4 letters · shape CVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • fondusffondus · fnodus · fodnus · fonddus · fondsu · fonduss · fonndus · fonuds
  • fonsffons · fnos · fonns · fonss · fosn · ofns

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "fondus" for "fons" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "fondus" is a verb and "fons" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary French text, does "fondus" or "fons" show up more?
"fondus" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #31,499 in our French list, against #43,445 for "fons". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

You've compared "fondus" and "fons". Here's where to go from here.

  • Full dictionary entry for "fondus" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "fons" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #35,556 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "fondus" and "fons" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "foins vs fons". 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 #35,556 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