Which to use
“pie” and “pis” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #8,596
- “pie” frequency rank
- #3,350
- “pis” frequency rank
- 11946
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | pie | pis |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Passereau de la famille des corvidés à longue queue, à plumage noir et au ventre blanc, renommé pour son bavardage et son attirance envers les objets brillants. | Mamelle de bête laitière (vache, brebis, etc.). |
Same sound, different letters: pie vs pis
Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 2 letters.
Ear matches; page differs - pie and pis
This is the hard kind. pie and pis are pronounced identically (\pi\) and both work as anoun. Neither the ear nor the grammar will rescue you; only the meaning does, so the glosses below are the whole decision. They differ by a single letter - e in “pie” becomes s in “pis”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 11946, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
pie is recorded at frequency rank #8,596, classified as anoun, pronounced \pi\. pis is at rank #3,350, tagged as anoun, pronounced \pi\.
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 11946, this pair ranks #407,160 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of pie vs pis
Shared letters: ip. Private to "pie": e. Private to "pis": s.
"pie" · 3 letters · shape CVV · "pis" · 3 letters · shape CVC
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "pie" and "pis" mean the same thing in a sentence?
In ordinary French text, does "pie" or "pis" show up more?
After this comparison
You've separated the homophone pair "pie" / "pis". Follow the links when you need the full entry or a neighbour that trips the same ear.
- Full dictionary entry for "pie" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "pis" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #407,160 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "pie" and "pis" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "pie vs prep". Nearby pair
Confusion rank #407,160 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.