plairavsplaisWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#12,444
“plaira” frequency rank
#13,865
“plais” frequency rank
26309
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature plaira plais
Definition Troisième personne du singulier du futur de plaire. Première personne du singulier de l’indicatif présent de plaire.

Where the eye mixes plaira and plais

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

6 ch
plaira
5 ch
plais

Why the eye confuses plaira with plais

A purely visual mix-up. plaira (\plɛ.ʁa\) and plais (\plɛ\) 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 26309, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

plaira is recorded at frequency rank #12,444, classified as averb, pronounced \plɛ.ʁa\. plais is at rank #13,865, tagged as averb, pronounced \plɛ\.

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 26309, this pair ranks #335,830 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of plaira vs plais

Shared letters: ailp. Private to "plaira": r. Private to "plais": s.

"plaira" · 6 letters · shape CCVVCV  ·  "plais" · 5 letters · shape CCVVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • plairalpaira · palira · plaiar · plairra · plaria · pliara · pllaira · pplaira
  • plaislpais · palis · plaiss · plasi · plias · pllais · pplais

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "plaira" and "plais" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\plɛ.ʁa\ versus \plɛ\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary French text, does "plaira" or "plais" show up more?
"plaira" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #12,444 in our French list, against #13,865 for "plais". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "plaira" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "plais" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #335,830 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "plaira" and "plais" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "plais vs Polaris". 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 #335,830 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