Which to use
“payons” is a verb and “pons” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #28,286
- “payons” frequency rank
- #21,727
- “pons” frequency rank
- 50013
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | payons | pons |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Première personne du pluriel du présent de l’indicatif de payer. | Pont. |
Letter map: payons vs pons
Shared letters muted; letters that set payons and pons apart highlighted. Shared run: 4. payons runs 6 letters (CVVVCC) against pons's 4 (CVCC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Role in the sentence - payons and pons
Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: payons is averb and ponsanoun. On the page they differ by 2 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 50013, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
payons is recorded at frequency rank #28,286, classified as averb, pronounced \pɛ.jɔ̃\. pons is at rank #21,727, tagged as anoun.
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 50013, this pair ranks #165,977 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of payons vs pons
Shared letters: nops. Private to "payons": ay. Private to "pons": -.
"payons" · 6 letters · shape CVVVCC · "pons" · 4 letters · shape CVCC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "payons" and "pons" mean the same thing in a sentence?
In ordinary French text, does "payons" or "pons" show up more?
What to do next
You've compared "payons" and "pons". Here's where to go from here.
- Full dictionary entry for "payons" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "pons" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #165,977 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "payons" and "pons" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "parions vs payons". 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 #165,977 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.