malsain vs malsains, What's the Difference?

Which to use

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

#16,410
“malsain” frequency rank: #47,440
“malsains” frequency rank: 63850
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature	malsain	malsains
Definition	Qui n’est pas sain, qui a en soi le germe de quelque maladie.	Masculin pluriel de malsain.

Same sound, different letters: malsain vs malsains

Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 7 letters. malsain runs 7 letters (CVCCVVC) against malsains's 8 (CVCCVVCC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

7 ch

malsain

8 ch

malsains

Homophone desk: malsain vs malsains

This is the hard kind. malsain and malsains are pronounced identically (\mal.sɛ̃\) and both work as anadjective. 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) - “malsain” sits inside “malsains”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 63850, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

malsain is recorded at frequency rank #16,410, classified as anadj, pronounced \mal.sɛ̃\. malsains is at rank #47,440, tagged as anadj, pronounced \mal.sɛ̃\.

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 63850, this pair ranks #79,906 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of malsain vs malsains

Shared letters: ailmns. Private to "malsain": -. Private to "malsains": -.

"malsain" · 7 letters · shape CVCCVVC · "malsains" · 8 letters · shape CVCCVVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

malsain ← amlsain · malasin · mallsain · malsainn · malsani · malsian · malssain · maslain
malsains ← amlsains · malasins · mallsains · malsainns · malsainss · malsaisn · malsanis · malsians

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "malsain" and "malsains" mean the same thing in a sentence?

No. They are pronounced the same (\mal.sɛ̃\), which is exactly why they get swapped in writing, but the dictionary meanings above are different, and pronunciation is no guide here.

Which is more common, "malsain" or "malsains"?

"malsain" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #16,410 in our French list, against #47,440 for "malsains". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

You've separated the homophone pair "malsain" / "malsains". Follow the links when you need the full entry or a neighbour that trips the same ear.

Full dictionary entry for "malsain" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
Full dictionary entry for "malsains" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
This pair ranks #79,906 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
"malsain" and "malsains" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "malsaines vs malsains". 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 #79,906 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.