perçoisvspersosTell them apart

Quick tell: perçois is a verb, persos is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“perçois” is a verb and “persos” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#34,246
“perçois” frequency rank
#18,557
“persos” frequency rank
52803
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature perçois persos
Definition Première personne du singulier de l’indicatif présent de percevoir. Pluriel de perso.

Where the eye mixes perçois and persos

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence.

7 ch
perçois
6 ch
persos

Look-alike desk: perçois vs persos

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: perçois is \pɛʁ.swa\ while persos is \pɛʁ.so\. 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 (verb vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 52803, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

perçois is recorded at frequency rank #34,246, classified as averb, pronounced \pɛʁ.swa\. persos is at rank #18,557, tagged as anadj, pronounced \pɛʁ.so\.

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 52803, this pair ranks #145,181 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of perçois vs persos

Shared letters: eoprs. Private to "perçois": . Private to "persos": -.

"perçois" · 7 letters · shape CVCCVVC  ·  "persos" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • persoseprsos · peross · perrsos · persoss · perssos · pesros · ppersos · presos

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "perçois" for "persos" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "perçois" is a verb and "persos" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "perçois" or "persos"?
"persos" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #18,557 in our French list, against #34,246 for "perçois". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.

  • Full dictionary entry for "perçois" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "persos" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #145,181 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "perçois" and "persos" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "perchoir vs perçois". 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 #145,181 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