perfvspriWhat's the difference?

Which to use

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

#24,321
“perf” frequency rank
#26,137
“pri” frequency rank
50458
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature perf pri
Definition Performance. Argile, glaise.

Where the eye mixes perf and pri

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.

4 ch
perf
3 ch
pri

Visual trap between perf and pri

A purely visual mix-up. perf (\pɛʁf\) and pri (\ˈpriː\) 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 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 50458, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

perf is recorded at frequency rank #24,321, classified as anoun, pronounced \pɛʁf\. pri is at rank #26,137, tagged as anoun, pronounced \ˈpriː\.

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 50458, this pair ranks #162,447 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of perf vs pri

Shared letters: pr. Private to "perf": ef. Private to "pri": i.

"perf" · 4 letters · shape CVCC  ·  "pri" · 3 letters · shape CCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • perfeprf · pefr · perff · perrf · pperf · pref

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "perf" and "pri" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently (\pɛʁf\ versus \ˈpriː\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary French text, does "perf" or "pri" show up more?
"perf" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #24,321 in our French list, against #26,137 for "pri". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "perf" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "pri" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #162,447 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "perf" and "pri" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "prep vs pri". 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 #162,447 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