jusvsjusteWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: jus is a noun, juste is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“jus” is a noun and “juste” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#3,768
“jus” frequency rank
#131
“juste” frequency rank
3899
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature jus juste
Definition Solution aqueuse obtenue à partir d’un produit solide par pression, coction, infusion ou tout autre moyen. Qui est conforme au droit, à la raison et à la justice.

Where the eye mixes jus and juste

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.

3 ch
jus
5 ch
juste

Why the eye confuses jus with juste

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: jus is \ʒy\ while juste is \ʒyst\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 2 extra letter(s) - “jus” sits inside “juste”, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 3899, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

jus is recorded at frequency rank #3,768, classified as anoun, pronounced \ʒy\. juste is at rank #131, tagged as anadj, pronounced \ʒyst\.

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 3899, this pair ranks #432,944 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of jus vs juste

Shared letters: jsu. Private to "jus": -. Private to "juste": et.

"jus" · 3 letters · shape CVC  ·  "juste" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • justejjuste · jsute · juset · jusste · justte · jutse · ujste

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "jus" for "juste" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "jus" is a noun and "juste" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "jus" vs "juste" - which ranks higher?
"juste" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #131 in our French list, against #3,768 for "jus". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

What to do next

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "jus" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "juste" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #432,944 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "jus" and "juste" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "jor vs jus". 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 #432,944 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