LonsvslungConfusable pair

Quick tell: Lons is a name, lung is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“Lons” is a name and “lung” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#36,034
“Lons” frequency rank
#46,871
“lung” frequency rank
82905
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature Lons lung
Definition Nom de famille. Poumon.

Letter map: Lons vs lung

Shared letters muted; letters that set Lons and lung apart highlighted. Shared run: 2. Lons and lung follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

4 ch
Lons
4 ch
lung

Part-of-speech tell for Lons / lung

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: Lons is aname and lunganoun. On the page they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 82905, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

Lons is recorded at frequency rank #36,034, classified as aname. lung is at rank #46,871, tagged as anoun, pronounced \lʌŋ\.

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 82905, this pair ranks #15,787 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of Lons vs lung

Shared letters: ln. Private to "Lons": os. Private to "lung": gu.

"Lons" · 4 letters · shape CVCC  ·  "lung" · 4 letters · shape CVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • Lons ← llons · lnos · lonns · lonss · losn · olns
  • lung ← llung · lnug · lugn · lungg · lunng · ulng

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "Lons" for "lung" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "Lons" is a name and "lung" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "Lons" or "lung"?
"Lons" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #36,034 in our French list, against #46,871 for "lung". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Pair "Lons" vs "lung" is on the table, pick a follow-up below.

  • Full dictionary entry for "Lons" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "lung" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #15,787 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "Lons" and "lung" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "longo vs lung". 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 #15,787 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