Which to use
“lires” is a noun and “listés” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #35,129
- “lires” frequency rank
- #37,895
- “listés” frequency rank
- 73024
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | lires | listés |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Pluriel de lire. | Participe passé masculin pluriel de lister. |
Where the eye mixes lires and listés
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. lires runs 5 letters (CVCVC) against listés's 6 (CVCCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Why the eye confuses lires with listés
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: lires is \liʁ\ while listés is \lis.te\. 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 verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 73024, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
lires is recorded at frequency rank #35,129, classified as anoun, pronounced \liʁ\. listés is at rank #37,895, tagged as averb, pronounced \lis.te\.
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 73024, this pair ranks #41,914 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of lires vs listés
Shared letters: ils. Private to "lires": er. Private to "listés": té.
"lires" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC · "listés" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
- lires ← ilres · liers · liress · lirres · lirse · llires · lries
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "lires" and "listés" mean the same thing in a sentence?
Frequency check: "lires" vs "listés" - which ranks higher?
What to do next
Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.
- Full dictionary entry for "lires" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "listés" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #41,914 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "lires" and "listés" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "leste vs listés". 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 #41,914 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.