Which to use
“poisson” and “poissons” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #2,589
- “poisson” frequency rank
- #2,947
- “poissons” frequency rank
- 5536
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | poisson | poissons |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Animal possédant un squelette, généralement ovipare (mais parfois ovovivipare ou vivipare), vivant dans l’eau, et respirant généralement par des branchies (bien que certaines espèces aient des systèmes de respiration aérienne complémentaire, comme les poumons des dipneustes ou le labyrinthe des anabantidés). | Pluriel de poisson. |
Same sound, different letters: poisson vs poissons
Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 7 letters. poisson runs 7 letters (CVVCCVC) against poissons's 8 (CVVCCVCC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Same sound, different spelling - poisson / poissons
This is the hard kind. poisson and poissons are pronounced identically (\pwa.sɔ̃\) and both work as anoun. Neither the ear nor the grammar will rescue you; only the meaning does, so the glosses below are the whole decision. They differ by 1 extra letter(s) - “poisson” sits inside “poissons”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 5536, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
poisson is recorded at frequency rank #2,589, classified as anoun, pronounced \pwa.sɔ̃\. poissons is at rank #2,947, tagged as anoun, pronounced \pwa.sɔ̃\.
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 5536, this pair ranks #428,741 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of poisson vs poissons
Shared letters: inops. Private to "poisson": -. Private to "poissons": -.
"poisson" · 7 letters · shape CVVCCVC · "poissons" · 8 letters · shape CVVCCVCC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "poisson" and "poissons" mean the same thing in a sentence?
In ordinary French text, does "poisson" or "poissons" show up more?
Useful next steps
"poisson" and "poissons" share a sound, keep the gloss open, then jump to the headword or a nearby trap.
- Full dictionary entry for "poisson" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "poissons" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #428,741 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "poisson" and "poissons" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "pinson vs poisson". 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 #428,741 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.