lunchvsluthWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#26,083
“lunch” frequency rank
#36,476
“luth” frequency rank
62559
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature lunch luth
Definition Repas servi à ses invités sous forme de buffet, collation. Cordophone portable d’origine arabe, de corps généralement piriforme prolongé par un manche recouvert d'une touche sur laquelle le musicien appuie avec les doigts d'une main les cordes tendues attachées au cordier à une extrémité, et à la table d'harmonie à l'autre, ceci afin de modifier les notes obtenues, tandis que de l'autre main il excite les cordes à vibrer au-dessus de la caisse de résonance, soit en les tirant et les relâchant vivement, ou les frappant, soit en les frottant avec un outil tel un archet.

Where the eye mixes lunch and luth

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.

5 ch
lunch
4 ch
luth

Look-alike desk: lunch vs luth

A purely visual mix-up. lunch (\lœntʃ\) and luth (\lyt\) 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 62559, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

lunch is recorded at frequency rank #26,083, classified as anoun, pronounced \lœntʃ\. luth is at rank #36,476, tagged as anoun, pronounced \lyt\.

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 62559, this pair ranks #86,455 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of lunch vs luth

Shared letters: hlu. Private to "lunch": cn. Private to "luth": t.

"lunch" · 5 letters · shape CVCCC  ·  "luth" · 4 letters · shape CVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • lunchllunch · lnuch · lucnh · luncch · lunchh · lunhc · lunnch · ulnch
  • luthlluth · ltuh · luht · luthh · lutth · ulth

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "lunch" for "luth" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (\lœntʃ\ versus \lyt\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary French text, does "lunch" or "luth" show up more?
"lunch" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #26,083 in our French list, against #36,476 for "luth". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "lunch" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "luth" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #86,455 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "lunch" and "luth" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "lure vs luth". 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 #86,455 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