idesvsireWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#42,389
“ides” frequency rank
#23,590
“ire” frequency rank
65979
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature ides ire
Definition Le quinzième jour des mois de mars, de mai, de juillet et d’octobre dans le calendrier des anciens Romains, et le treizième des autres mois. Colère.

Where the eye mixes ides and ire

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

4 ch
ides
3 ch
ire

Look-alike desk: ides vs ire

A purely visual mix-up. ides (\id\) and ire (\iʁ\) 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 65979, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

ides is recorded at frequency rank #42,389, classified as anoun, pronounced \id\. ire is at rank #23,590, tagged as anoun, pronounced \iʁ\.

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 65979, this pair ranks #69,878 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of ides vs ire

Shared letters: ei. Private to "ides": ds. Private to "ire": r.

"ides" · 4 letters · shape VCVC  ·  "ire" · 3 letters · shape VCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • idesiddes · idess · ieds

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "ides" and "ire" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\id\ versus \iʁ\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary French text, does "ides" or "ire" show up more?
"ire" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #23,590 in our French list, against #42,389 for "ides". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Eye-level mix-up between "ides" and "ire" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "ides" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "ire" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #69,878 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "ides" and "ire" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "ides vs ime". 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 #69,878 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