Which to use
“mois” is a noun and “mou” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #184
- “mois” frequency rank
- #8,739
- “mou” frequency rank
- 8923
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | mois | mou |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Chacune des douze parties de l’année, dont chacune contient trente ou trente et un jours, excepté la seconde (février), qui est de vingt-huit jours dans les années ordinaires, et de vingt-neuf dans les années bissextiles. | Qui cède facilement au toucher, qui reçoit facilement l’impression des autres corps. |
Where the eye mixes mois and mou
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.
Visual trap between mois and mou
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: mois is \mwa\ while mou is \mu\. 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 adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 8923, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
mois is recorded at frequency rank #184, classified as anoun, pronounced \mwa\. mou is at rank #8,739, tagged as anadj, pronounced \mu\.
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 8923, this pair ranks #418,409 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of mois vs mou
Shared letters: mo. Private to "mois": is. Private to "mou": u.
"mois" · 4 letters · shape CVVC · "mou" · 3 letters · shape CVV
Known mistypes of this pair
- mois ← mios · mmois · moiss · mosi
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "mois" and "mou" mean the same thing in a sentence?
Which is more common, "mois" or "mou"?
Useful next steps
Eye-level mix-up between "mois" and "mou" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.
- Full dictionary entry for "mois" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "mou" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #418,409 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "mois" and "mou" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "mou vs MWh". 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 #418,409 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.