Which to use
“nouveau” and “nouveaux” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #191
- “nouveau” frequency rank
- #530
- “nouveaux” frequency rank
- 721
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | nouveau | nouveaux |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Qui n’existait pas auparavant, avant telle date donnée, avec rien de pareil ni de comparable. | Masculin pluriel de nouveau. |
Same sound, different letters: nouveau vs nouveaux
Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 7 letters. nouveau runs 7 letters (CVVCVVV) against nouveaux's 8 (CVVCVVVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Same sound, different spelling - nouveau / nouveaux
This is the hard kind. nouveau and nouveaux are pronounced identically (\nu.vo\) 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) - “nouveau” sits inside “nouveaux”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 721, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
nouveau is recorded at frequency rank #191, classified as anadj, pronounced \nu.vo\. nouveaux is at rank #530, tagged as anadj, pronounced \nu.vo\.
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 721, this pair ranks #439,222 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of nouveau vs nouveaux
Shared letters: aenouv. Private to "nouveau": -. Private to "nouveaux": x.
"nouveau" · 7 letters · shape CVVCVVV · "nouveaux" · 8 letters · shape CVVCVVVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "nouveau" and "nouveaux" mean the same thing in a sentence?
Frequency check: "nouveau" vs "nouveaux" - which ranks higher?
What to do next
You've separated the homophone pair "nouveau" / "nouveaux". Follow the links when you need the full entry or a neighbour that trips the same ear.
- Full dictionary entry for "nouveau" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "nouveaux" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #439,222 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "nouveau" and "nouveaux" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Nouméa vs nouveau". 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 #439,222 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.