pintesvspontsConfusable pair

Which to use

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

#44,096
“pintes” frequency rank
#4,600
“ponts” frequency rank
48696
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature pintes ponts
Definition Pluriel de pinte. Pluriel de pont.

Where the eye mixes pintes and ponts

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence.

6 ch
pintes
5 ch
ponts

Why the eye confuses pintes with ponts

A purely visual mix-up. pintes (\pɛ̃t\) and ponts (\pɔ̃\) 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 48696, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

pintes is recorded at frequency rank #44,096, classified as anoun, pronounced \pɛ̃t\. ponts is at rank #4,600, tagged as anoun, pronounced \pɔ̃\.

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 48696, this pair ranks #176,762 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of pintes vs ponts

Shared letters: npst. Private to "pintes": ei. Private to "ponts": o.

"pintes" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC  ·  "ponts" · 5 letters · shape CVCCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • pintesipntes · pinets · pinntes · pintess · pintse · pinttes · pitnes · pnites
  • pontsopnts · pnots · ponnts · ponst · pontss · pontts · potns · pponts

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "pintes" and "ponts" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\pɛ̃t\ versus \pɔ̃\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "pintes" vs "ponts" - which ranks higher?
"ponts" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #4,600 in our French list, against #44,096 for "pintes". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "pintes" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "ponts" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #176,762 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "pintes" and "ponts" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "pintes vs pontet". 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 #176,762 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