levslureWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: le is a article, lure is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“le” is an article and “lure” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#3
“le” frequency rank
#48,019
“lure” frequency rank
48022
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature le lure
Definition Ce… dont on parle maintenant. Déterminant marquant un nom masculin singulier, référant à une seule entité possible dans un contexte. Leurre.

Where the eye mixes le and lure

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

2 ch
le
4 ch
lure

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: le is \lə\ while lure is \lʊər\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 2 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (article vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 48022, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

le is recorded at frequency rank #3, classified as anarticle, pronounced \lə\. lure is at rank #48,019, tagged as anoun, pronounced \lʊər\.

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 48022, this pair ranks #182,271 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of le vs lure

Shared letters: el. Private to "le": -. Private to "lure": ru.

"le" · 2 letters · shape CV  ·  "lure" · 4 letters · shape CVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • lurellure · lrue · lurre · ulre

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "le" and "lure" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "le" is an article and "lure" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "le" or "lure"?
"le" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #3 in our French list, against #48,019 for "lure". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list