Which to use
“lice” and “lips” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #14,965
- “lice” frequency rank
- #46,867
- “lips” frequency rank
- 61832
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | lice | lips |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Palissade, en particulier celle qui délimite le champ clos préparé pour les jeux et exercices équestres, les joutes, tournois, etc. | Pluriel de lip. |
Where the eye mixes lice and lips
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence. lice (CVCV) and lips (CVCC) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.
Look-alike desk: lice vs lips
A purely visual mix-up. lice (\lis\) and lips (\ˈlɪps\) 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 61832, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
lice is recorded at frequency rank #14,965, classified as anoun, pronounced \lis\. lips is at rank #46,867, tagged as anoun, pronounced \ˈlɪps\.
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 61832, this pair ranks #90,180 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of lice vs lips
Shared letters: il. Private to "lice": ce. Private to "lips": ps.
"lice" · 4 letters · shape CVCV · "lips" · 4 letters · shape CVCC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "lice" and "lips" mean the same thing in a sentence?
In ordinary French text, does "lice" or "lips" show up more?
Useful next steps
Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.
- Full dictionary entry for "lice" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "lips" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #90,180 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "lice" and "lips" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "lep vs lips". 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 #90,180 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.