poignevspoignetsWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#34,255
“poigne” frequency rank
#18,284
“poignets” frequency rank
52539
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature poigne poignets
Definition La force du poignet. Pluriel de poignet.

Where the eye mixes poigne and poignets

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 6 letters in sequence. poigne runs 6 letters (CVVCCV) against poignets's 8 (CVVCCVCC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

6 ch
poigne
8 ch
poignets

Why the eye confuses poigne with poignets

A purely visual mix-up. poigne (\pwaɲ\) and poignets (\pwa.ɲɛ\) 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) - “poigne” sits inside “poignets”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 52539, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

poigne is recorded at frequency rank #34,255, classified as anoun, pronounced \pwaɲ\. poignets is at rank #18,284, tagged as anoun, pronounced \pwa.ɲɛ\.

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 52539, this pair ranks #147,041 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of poigne vs poignets

Shared letters: eginop. Private to "poigne": -. Private to "poignets": st.

"poigne" · 6 letters · shape CVVCCV  ·  "poignets" · 8 letters · shape CVVCCVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • poigneopigne · piogne · pogine · poigen · poiggne · poignne · poinge · ppoigne
  • poignetsopignets · piognets · poginets · poigents · poiggnets · poignest · poignetss · poignetts

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "poigne" for "poignets" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (\pwaɲ\ versus \pwa.ɲɛ\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "poigne" vs "poignets" - which ranks higher?
"poignets" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #18,284 in our French list, against #34,255 for "poigne". 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 "poigne" and "poignets" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "poigne" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "poignets" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #147,041 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "poigne" and "poignets" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "plaigne vs poigne". 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 #147,041 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