pilotvspilotisWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#31,183
“pilot” frequency rank
#36,997
“pilotis” frequency rank
68180
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature pilot pilotis
Definition Gros pieu de pilotis. Système de fondation par pieux foncés et recepés portant radier, appelés pilots, en terrain meuble et aquifère.

Where the eye mixes pilot and pilotis

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence. pilot runs 5 letters (CVCVC) against pilotis's 7 (CVCVCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

5 ch
pilot
7 ch
pilotis

Why the eye confuses pilot with pilotis

A purely visual mix-up. pilot (\pi.lo\) and pilotis (\pi.lɔ.ti\) 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 2 extra letter(s) - “pilot” sits inside “pilotis”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 68180, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

pilot is recorded at frequency rank #31,183, classified as anoun, pronounced \pi.lo\. pilotis is at rank #36,997, tagged as anoun, pronounced \pi.lɔ.ti\.

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 68180, this pair ranks #60,230 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of pilot vs pilotis

Shared letters: ilopt. Private to "pilot": -. Private to "pilotis": s.

"pilot" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC  ·  "pilotis" · 7 letters · shape CVCVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • pilotiplot · pillot · pilott · pilto · piolt · pliot · ppilot
  • pilotisiplotis · pillotis · piloits · pilotiss · pilotsi · pilottis · piltois · pioltis

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "pilot" and "pilotis" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently (\pi.lo\ versus \pi.lɔ.ti\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "pilot" vs "pilotis" - which ranks higher?
"pilot" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #31,183 in our French list, against #36,997 for "pilotis". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "pilot" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "pilotis" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #60,230 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "pilot" and "pilotis" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "pilotis vs pivots". 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 #60,230 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