jouisvsjoutesWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: jouis is a verb, joutes is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“jouis” is a verb and “joutes” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#36,019
“jouis” frequency rank
#31,570
“joutes” frequency rank
67589
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature jouis joutes
Definition Première personne du singulier de l’indicatif présent de jouir. Pluriel de joute.

Where the eye mixes jouis and joutes

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. jouis runs 5 letters (CVVVC) against joutes's 6 (CVVCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

5 ch
jouis
6 ch
joutes

Why the eye confuses jouis with joutes

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: jouis is \ʒwi\ while joutes is \ʒut\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (verb vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 67589, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

jouis is recorded at frequency rank #36,019, classified as averb, pronounced \ʒwi\. joutes is at rank #31,570, tagged as anoun, pronounced \ʒut\.

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 67589, this pair ranks #62,767 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of jouis vs joutes

Shared letters: josu. Private to "jouis": i. Private to "joutes": et.

"jouis" · 5 letters · shape CVVVC  ·  "joutes" · 6 letters · shape CVVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • jouis ← jjouis · joius · jouiss · jousi · juois · ojuis
  • joutes ← jjoutes · jotues · joutess · joutse · jouttes · juotes · ojutes

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "jouis" for "joutes" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "jouis" is a verb and "joutes" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "jouis" or "joutes"?
"joutes" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #31,570 in our French list, against #36,019 for "jouis". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.

  • Full dictionary entry for "jouis" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "joutes" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #62,767 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "jouis" and "joutes" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Josie vs jouis". 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 #62,767 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