Which to use
“pigeon” is a noun and “piger” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #11,634
- “pigeon” frequency rank
- #31,649
- “piger” frequency rank
- 43283
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | pigeon | piger |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Oiseau de la famille des columbidés vivant en plaine et dans les villes, et se nourrissant principalement de graines. | Prendre, saisir. |
Where the eye mixes pigeon and piger
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. pigeon runs 6 letters (CVCVVC) against piger's 5 (CVCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Visual trap between pigeon and piger
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: pigeon is \pi.ʒɔ̃\ while piger is \pi.ʒe\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 43283, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
pigeon is recorded at frequency rank #11,634, classified as anoun, pronounced \pi.ʒɔ̃\. piger is at rank #31,649, tagged as averb, pronounced \pi.ʒe\.
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 43283, this pair ranks #219,284 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of pigeon vs piger
Shared letters: egip. Private to "pigeon": no. Private to "piger": r.
"pigeon" · 6 letters · shape CVCVVC · "piger" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "pigeon" and "piger" mean the same thing in a sentence?
In ordinary French text, does "pigeon" or "piger" show up more?
After this comparison
Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.
- Full dictionary entry for "pigeon" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "piger" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #219,284 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "pigeon" and "piger" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "peler vs piger". 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 #219,284 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.