lutvsluthWhat's the difference?

Which to use

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

#40,358
“lut” frequency rank
#36,476
“luth” frequency rank
76834
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature lut luth
Definition Se dit de pâtes ou d'enduits qu'on applique sur les bouchons des vases pour en assurer la fermeture hermétique, autour des cornues, des tubes de verre pour les soustraire à l'action directe du feu, ou qu'on utilise pour obturer des trous, pour faire des joints etc. 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.

Same sound, different letters: lut vs luth

Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 3 letters. lut runs 3 letters (CVC) against luth's 4 (CVCC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

3 ch
lut
4 ch
luth

Same sound, different spelling - lut / luth

This is the hard kind. lut and luth are pronounced identically (\lyt\) and both work as anoun. Neither the ear nor the grammar will rescue you; only the meaning does, so the glosses below are the whole decision. They differ by 1 extra letter(s) - “lut” sits inside “luth”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 76834, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

lut is recorded at frequency rank #40,358, classified as anoun, pronounced \lyt\. 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 76834, this pair ranks #30,053 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of lut vs luth

Shared letters: ltu. Private to "lut": -. Private to "luth": h.

"lut" · 3 letters · shape CVC  ·  "luth" · 4 letters · shape CVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • luth ← lluth · ltuh · luht · luthh · lutth · ulth

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "lut" for "luth" ever safe?
No. They are pronounced the same (\lyt\), which is exactly why they get swapped in writing, but the dictionary meanings above are different, and pronunciation is no guide here.
Frequency check: "lut" vs "luth" - which ranks higher?
"luth" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #36,476 in our French list, against #40,358 for "lut". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

"lut" and "luth" share a sound, keep the gloss open, then jump to the headword or a nearby trap.

  • Full dictionary entry for "lut" 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 #30,053 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "lut" and "luth" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "lep vs lut". 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 #30,053 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