piétonsvsprenonsWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: piétons is a adjective, prenons is a verb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

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

#11,099
“piétons” frequency rank
#6,730
“prenons” frequency rank
17829
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature piétons prenons
Definition Masculin pluriel de piéton. Première personne du pluriel de l’indicatif présent du verbe prendre.

Where the spellings diverge

Shared letters are muted; the letters that actually set piétons and prenons apart are highlighted. They share 4 letters in sequence, which is exactly why the eye skips the difference.

7 ch
piétons
7 ch
prenons

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: piétons is \pje.tɔ̃\ while prenons is \pʁə.nɔ̃\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 3 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (adjective vs verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 17829, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

piétons is recorded at frequency rank #11,099, classified as anadj, pronounced \pje.tɔ̃\. prenons is at rank #6,730, tagged as averb, pronounced \pʁə.nɔ̃\.

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 17829, this pair ranks #381,281 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of piétons vs prenons

Shared letters: nops. Private to "piétons": ité. Private to "prenons": er.

"piétons" · 7 letters · shape CVVCVCC  ·  "prenons" · 7 letters · shape CCVCVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • prenonspernons · pprenons · prennons · prennos · prenonns · prenonss · prenosn · preonns

Frequency comparison

piétons#11,099
prenons#6,730

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "piétons" and "prenons" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "piétons" is an adjective and "prenons" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "piétons" or "prenons"?
"prenons" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #6,730 in our French list, against #11,099 for "piétons". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Remembering piétons vs prenons

The fastest way to pick the right one every time.

  • Check the role first: if you need an adjective, it's “piétons”; for a verb, it's “prenons”.
  • See each word in full, definition, IPA, etymology and its other confusables. Full “piétons” entry
  • Browse more pairs most likely to be confused. Most confusable

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list