perfsvsporesWhat's the difference?

Which to use

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

#46,951
“perfs” frequency rank
#25,082
“pores” frequency rank
72033
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature perfs pores
Definition Pluriel de perf. Pluriel de pore.

Where the eye mixes perfs and pores

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. perfs (CVCCC) and pores (CVCVC) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.

5 ch
perfs
5 ch
pores

Visual trap between perfs and pores

A purely visual mix-up. perfs (\pɛʁf\) and pores (\pɔʁ\) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 72033, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

perfs is recorded at frequency rank #46,951, classified as anoun, pronounced \pɛʁf\. pores is at rank #25,082, tagged as anoun, pronounced \pɔʁ\.

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 72033, this pair ranks #45,445 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of perfs vs pores

Shared letters: eprs. Private to "perfs": f. Private to "pores": o.

"perfs" · 5 letters · shape CVCCC  ·  "pores" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • perfs ← eprfs · pefrs · perffs · perfss · perrfs · persf · pperfs · prefs
  • pores ← opres · poers · poress · porres · ppores

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "perfs" for "pores" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (\pɛʁf\ versus \pɔʁ\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary French text, does "perfs" or "pores" show up more?
"pores" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #25,082 in our French list, against #46,951 for "perfs". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "perfs" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "pores" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #45,445 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "perfs" and "pores" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "perfs vs pètes". 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 #45,445 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