lamasvslavisWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#40,346
“lamas” frequency rank
#41,866
“lavis” frequency rank
82212
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature lamas lavis
Definition Pluriel de lama. Technique de dessin utilisant une seule couleur provenant souvent de l’encre de Chine, mais aussi le bistre, la sépia ou quelque autre substance colorante qui sont utilisées à des degrés de dilution divers.

Where the eye mixes lamas and lavis

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. lamas and lavis follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCVC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

5 ch
lamas
5 ch
lavis

Look-alike desk: lamas vs lavis

A purely visual mix-up. lamas (\la.ma\) and lavis (\la.vi\) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 82212, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

lamas is recorded at frequency rank #40,346, classified as anoun, pronounced \la.ma\. lavis is at rank #41,866, tagged as anoun, pronounced \la.vi\.

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 82212, this pair ranks #17,175 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of lamas vs lavis

Shared letters: als. Private to "lamas": m. Private to "lavis": iv.

"lamas" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC  ·  "lavis" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • lamas ← almas · laams · lamass · lammas · lamsa · llamas · lmaas
  • lavis ← alvis · laivs · laviss · lavsi · lavvis · llavis · lvais

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "lamas" and "lavis" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\la.ma\ versus \la.vi\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary French text, does "lamas" or "lavis" show up more?
"lamas" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #40,346 in our French list, against #41,866 for "lavis". 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 "lamas" and "lavis" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "lamas" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "lavis" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #17,175 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "lamas" and "lavis" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "lavait vs lavis". 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 #17,175 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