frelonvsfrelonsWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#39,307
“frelon” frequency rank
#45,056
“frelons” frequency rank
84363
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature frelon frelons
Definition Sorte de grosse guêpe, de nom scientifique Vespa crabro. Pluriel de frelon.

Same sound, different letters: frelon vs frelons

Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 6 letters. frelon runs 6 letters (CCVCVC) against frelons's 7 (CCVCVCC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

6 ch
frelon
7 ch
frelons

Ear matches; page differs - frelon and frelons

This is the hard kind. frelon and frelons are pronounced identically (\fʁə.lɔ̃\) and both work as anoun. Neither the ear nor the grammar will rescue you; only the meaning does, so the glosses below are the whole decision. They differ by 1 extra letter(s) - “frelon” sits inside “frelons”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 84363, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

frelon is recorded at frequency rank #39,307, classified as anoun, pronounced \fʁə.lɔ̃\. frelons is at rank #45,056, tagged as anoun, pronounced \fʁə.lɔ̃\.

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 84363, this pair ranks #13,136 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of frelon vs frelons

Shared letters: eflnor. Private to "frelon": -. Private to "frelons": s.

"frelon" · 6 letters · shape CCVCVC  ·  "frelons" · 7 letters · shape CCVCVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • frelonferlon · ffrelon · frellon · frelno · frelonn · freoln · frleon · frrelon
  • frelonsferlons · ffrelons · frellons · frelnos · frelonns · frelonss · frelosn · freolns

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "frelon" for "frelons" ever safe?
No. They are pronounced the same (\fʁə.lɔ̃\), which is exactly why they get swapped in writing, but the dictionary meanings above are different, and pronunciation is no guide here.
Frequency check: "frelon" vs "frelons" - which ranks higher?
"frelon" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #39,307 in our French list, against #45,056 for "frelons". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

"frelon" and "frelons" share a sound, keep the gloss open, then jump to the headword or a nearby trap.

  • Full dictionary entry for "frelon" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "frelons" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #13,136 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "frelon" and "frelons" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "fêtons vs frelons". 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 #13,136 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