pètesvspintesTell them apart

Which to use

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

#48,737
“pètes” frequency rank
#44,096
“pintes” frequency rank
92833
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature pètes pintes
Definition Pluriel de pète. Pluriel de pinte.

Where the eye mixes pètes and pintes

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. pètes runs 5 letters (CVCVC) against pintes's 6 (CVCCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

5 ch
pètes
6 ch
pintes

Look-alike desk: pètes vs pintes

A purely visual mix-up. pètes (\pɛt\) and pintes (\pɛ̃t\) 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 92833, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

pètes is recorded at frequency rank #48,737, classified as anoun, pronounced \pɛt\. pintes is at rank #44,096, tagged as anoun, pronounced \pɛ̃t\.

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 92833, this pair ranks #2,718 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of pètes vs pintes

Shared letters: epst. Private to "pètes": è. Private to "pintes": in.

"pètes" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC  ·  "pintes" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • pintes ← ipntes · pinets · pinntes · pintess · pintse · pinttes · pitnes · pnites

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "pètes" and "pintes" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently (\pɛt\ versus \pɛ̃t\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary French text, does "pètes" or "pintes" show up more?
"pintes" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #44,096 in our French list, against #48,737 for "pètes". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "pètes" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "pintes" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #2,718 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "pètes" and "pintes" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "peep 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 #2,718 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