lastvslusTell them apart

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

Which to use

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

#10,733
“last” frequency rank
#12,613
“lus” frequency rank
23346
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature last lus
Definition Poids de deux tonneaux de mer ou 2000 kilogrammes. Masculin pluriel de lu.

Where the eye mixes last and lus

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

4 ch
last
3 ch
lus

Visual trap between last and lus

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: last is \last\ while lus is \ly\. 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 (noun vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 23346, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

last is recorded at frequency rank #10,733, classified as anoun, pronounced \last\. lus is at rank #12,613, tagged as anadj, pronounced \ly\.

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 23346, this pair ranks #353,037 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of last vs lus

Shared letters: ls. Private to "last": at. Private to "lus": u.

"last" · 4 letters · shape CVCC  ·  "lus" · 3 letters · shape CVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • lastalst · lasst · lastt · lats · llast · lsat

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "last" and "lus" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "last" is a noun and "lus" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary French text, does "last" or "lus" show up more?
"last" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #10,733 in our French list, against #12,613 for "lus". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "last" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "lus" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #353,037 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "last" and "lus" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "lep vs lus". 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 #353,037 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