Which to use
“le” and “les” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #3
- “le” frequency rank
- #7
- “les” frequency rank
- 10
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | le | les |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Ce… dont on parle maintenant. Déterminant marquant un nom masculin singulier, référant à une seule entité possible dans un contexte. | Pluriel de le ou la. |
Where the eye mixes le and les
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
A purely visual mix-up. le (\lə\) and les (\le\) 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 extra letter(s) - “le” sits inside “les”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 10, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
le is recorded at frequency rank #3, classified as anarticle, pronounced \lə\. les is at rank #7, tagged as anarticle, pronounced \le\.
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 10, this pair ranks #440,168 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of le vs les
Shared letters: el. Private to "le": -. Private to "les": s.
"le" · 2 letters · shape CV · "les" · 3 letters · shape CVC