noavsnoxTell them apart

Which to use

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

#41,927
“noa” frequency rank
#36,973
“nox” frequency rank
78900
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature noa nox
Definition Nom d’un cépage hybride américain franc de pied dont l’usage commercial est interdit en France depuis 1935. C'est un raisin blanc au goût foxé dont les petits grains se détachent de la rafle à maturité. Des particuliers en possèdent dans leur jardin. Nuit.

Where the eye mixes noa and nox

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence. noa (CVV) and nox (CVC) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.

3 ch
noa
3 ch
nox

Visual trap between noa and nox

A purely visual mix-up. noa (\no.a\) and nox (\noks\) 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 a single letter - a in “noa” becomes x in “nox”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 78900, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

noa is recorded at frequency rank #41,927, classified as anoun, pronounced \no.a\. nox is at rank #36,973, tagged as anoun, pronounced \noks\.

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 78900, this pair ranks #24,582 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of noa vs nox

Shared letters: no. Private to "noa": a. Private to "nox": x.

"noa" · 3 letters · shape CVV  ·  "nox" · 3 letters · shape CVC

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "noa" for "nox" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (\no.a\ versus \noks\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary French text, does "noa" or "nox" show up more?
"nox" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #36,973 in our French list, against #41,927 for "noa". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Eye-level mix-up between "noa" and "nox" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "noa" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "nox" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #24,582 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "noa" and "nox" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "noa vs nop". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #24,582 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