ievsIPWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#7,068
“ie” frequency rank
#8,871
“IP” frequency rank
15939
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature ie IP
Definition Neuvième lettre de l’alphabet cyrillique, е. Ensemble de règles décrivant les adresses du réseau, qui permet un service d’adressage unique pour l’ensemble des terminaux connectés à l’internet.

Where the eye mixes ie and IP

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 1 letter in sequence.

2 ch
ie
2 ch
IP

Why the eye confuses ie with IP

A purely visual mix-up. ie (\je\) and IP (\i.pe\) 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 a single letter - e in “ie” becomes p in “IP”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 15939, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

ie is recorded at frequency rank #7,068, classified as anoun, pronounced \je\. IP is at rank #8,871, tagged as anoun, pronounced \i.pe\.

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 15939, this pair ranks #390,152 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of ie vs IP

Shared letters: i. Private to "ie": e. Private to "IP": p.

"ie" · 2 letters · shape VV  ·  "IP" · 2 letters · shape VC

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "ie" for "IP" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (\je\ versus \i.pe\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary French text, does "ie" or "IP" show up more?
"ie" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #7,068 in our French list, against #8,871 for "IP". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "ie" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "IP" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #390,152 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "ie" and "IP" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "IP vs isi". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #390,152 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