lasersvsleadersTell them apart

Which to use

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

#24,653
“lasers” frequency rank
#7,338
“leaders” frequency rank
31991
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature lasers leaders
Definition Pluriel de laser. Pluriel de leader.

Where the eye mixes lasers and leaders

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence.

6 ch
lasers
7 ch
leaders

Visual trap between lasers and leaders

A purely visual mix-up. lasers (\la.zɛʁ\) and leaders (\li.dœʁ\) 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 31991, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

lasers is recorded at frequency rank #24,653, classified as anoun, pronounced \la.zɛʁ\. leaders is at rank #7,338, tagged as anoun, pronounced \li.dœʁ\.

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 31991, this pair ranks #300,270 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of lasers vs leaders

Shared letters: aelrs. Private to "lasers": -. Private to "leaders": d.

"lasers" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCC  ·  "leaders" · 7 letters · shape CVVCVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • lasersalsers · laesrs · laserrs · laserss · lasres · lassers · llasers · lsaers
  • leaderseladers · laeders · leadders · leaderrs · leaderss · leadesr · leadres · leaedrs

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "lasers" for "leaders" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (\la.zɛʁ\ versus \li.dœʁ\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "lasers" or "leaders"?
"leaders" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #7,338 in our French list, against #24,653 for "lasers". 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 "lasers" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "leaders" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #300,270 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "lasers" and "leaders" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "lasers vs later". 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 #300,270 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