Which to use
“foyer” is a noun and “fumer” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #3,260
- “foyer” frequency rank
- #4,336
- “fumer” frequency rank
- 7596
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | foyer | fumer |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | (Selon certains auteurs) Partie d’une cheminée se trouvant au devant de l’âtre (on brûle le bois), Il se trouve donc en dehors des jambages de la cheminée. Il est souvent constitué de pierres ou de briques si le sol de la pièce est en parquet. | Jeter de la fumée. |
Where the eye mixes foyer and fumer
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.
Visual trap between foyer and fumer
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: foyer is \fwa.je\ while fumer is \fy.me\. 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 (noun vs verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 7596, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
foyer is recorded at frequency rank #3,260, classified as anoun, pronounced \fwa.je\. fumer is at rank #4,336, tagged as averb, pronounced \fy.me\.
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 7596, this pair ranks #422,696 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of foyer vs fumer
Shared letters: efr. Private to "foyer": oy. Private to "fumer": mu.
"foyer" · 5 letters · shape CVVVC · "fumer" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "foyer" for "fumer" ever safe?
Which is more common, "foyer" or "fumer"?
Useful next steps
Eye-level mix-up between "foyer" and "fumer" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.
- Full dictionary entry for "foyer" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "fumer" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #422,696 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "foyer" and "fumer" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "foies vs foyer". 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 #422,696 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.