lierrevslièvresWhat's the difference?

Which to use

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

#32,047
“lierre” frequency rank
#41,388
“lièvres” frequency rank
73435
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature lierre lièvres
Definition Nom usuel des représentants du genre Hedera, plantes sempervirentes, qui rampent à terre ou qui grimpent le long des murailles et autour des arbres et dont le type est le lierre grimpant ou Hedera helix. Pluriel de lièvre.

Where the eye mixes lierre and lièvres

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. lierre runs 6 letters (CVVCCV) against lièvres's 7 (CVVCCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

6 ch
lierre
7 ch
lièvres

Why the eye confuses lierre with lièvres

A purely visual mix-up. lierre (\ljɛʁ\) and lièvres (\ljɛvʁ\) 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 73435, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

lierre is recorded at frequency rank #32,047, classified as anoun, pronounced \ljɛʁ\. lièvres is at rank #41,388, tagged as anoun, pronounced \ljɛvʁ\.

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 73435, this pair ranks #40,479 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of lierre vs lièvres

Shared letters: eilr. Private to "lierre": -. Private to "lièvres": svè.

"lierre" · 6 letters · shape CVVCCV  ·  "lièvres" · 7 letters · shape CVVCCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • lierre ← ilerre · leirre · liere · lierer · lirere · llierre

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "lierre" for "lièvres" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (\ljɛʁ\ versus \ljɛvʁ\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "lierre" vs "lièvres" - which ranks higher?
"lierre" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #32,047 in our French list, against #41,388 for "lièvres". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "lierre" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "lièvres" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #40,479 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "lierre" and "lièvres" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "lierre vs Littré". 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 #40,479 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