iosvsirisTell them apart

Which to use

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

#8,870
“ios” frequency rank
#9,504
“iris” frequency rank
18374
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature ios iris
Definition Pluriel de io. Partie colorée de l’œil qui environne la prunelle et qui présente quelquefois des nuances circulaires et concentriques.

Where the eye mixes ios and iris

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

3 ch
ios
4 ch
iris

Visual trap between ios and iris

A purely visual mix-up. ios (\jo\) and iris (\i.ʁis\) 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 18374, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

ios is recorded at frequency rank #8,870, classified as anoun, pronounced \jo\. iris is at rank #9,504, tagged as anoun, pronounced \i.ʁis\.

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 18374, this pair ranks #378,654 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of ios vs iris

Shared letters: is. Private to "ios": o. Private to "iris": r.

"ios" · 3 letters · shape VVC  ·  "iris" · 4 letters · shape VCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • irisiirs · iriss · irris · irsi · riis

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "ios" for "iris" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (\jo\ versus \i.ʁis\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "ios" vs "iris" - which ranks higher?
"ios" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #8,870 in our French list, against #9,504 for "iris". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "ios" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "iris" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #378,654 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "ios" and "iris" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "iris 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 #378,654 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