inkvsinoxTell them apart

Which to use

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

#45,673
“ink” frequency rank
#26,059
“inox” frequency rank
71732
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature ink inox
Definition Encre. Matériau dit inoxydable.

Where the eye mixes ink and inox

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence. ink runs 3 letters (VCC) against inox's 4 (VCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

3 ch
ink
4 ch
inox

Why the eye confuses ink with inox

A purely visual mix-up. ink (\ɪŋk\) and inox (\i.nɔks\) 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 71732, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

ink is recorded at frequency rank #45,673, classified as anoun, pronounced \ɪŋk\. inox is at rank #26,059, tagged as anoun, pronounced \i.nɔks\.

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 71732, this pair ranks #46,490 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of ink vs inox

Shared letters: in. Private to "ink": k. Private to "inox": ox.

"ink" · 3 letters · shape VCC  ·  "inox" · 4 letters · shape VCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • inox ← innox · inoxx · inxo · ionx

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "ink" and "inox" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\ɪŋk\ versus \i.nɔks\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "ink" or "inox"?
"inox" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #26,059 in our French list, against #45,673 for "ink". 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 "ink" and "inox" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "ink" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "inox" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #46,490 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "ink" and "inox" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "ink vs isi". 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 #46,490 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