polievspoliesConfusable pair

Which to use

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

#18,285
“polie” frequency rank
#43,074
“polies” frequency rank
61359
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature polie polies
Definition Féminin singulier de poli. Féminin pluriel de poli.

Same sound, different letters: polie vs polies

Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 5 letters. polie runs 5 letters (CVCVV) against polies's 6 (CVCVVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

5 ch
polie
6 ch
polies

Ear matches; page differs - polie and polies

This is the hard kind. polie and polies are pronounced identically (\po.li\) and both work as anadjective. 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) - “polie” sits inside “polies”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 61359, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

polie is recorded at frequency rank #18,285, classified as anadj, pronounced \po.li\. polies is at rank #43,074, tagged as anadj, pronounced \po.li\.

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 61359, this pair ranks #92,693 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of polie vs polies

Shared letters: eilop. Private to "polie": -. Private to "polies": s.

"polie" · 5 letters · shape CVCVV  ·  "polies" · 6 letters · shape CVCVVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • polie ← oplie · ploie · poile · polei · pollie · ppolie
  • polies ← oplies · ploies · poiles · poleis · poliess · polise · pollies · ppolies

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "polie" and "polies" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are pronounced the same (\po.li\), which is exactly why they get swapped in writing, but the dictionary meanings above are different, and pronunciation is no guide here.
Frequency check: "polie" vs "polies" - which ranks higher?
"polie" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #18,285 in our French list, against #43,074 for "polies". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Sound matches; spelling doesn't. Use the exits below to lock the right form or check a cousin pair.

  • Full dictionary entry for "polie" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "polies" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #92,693 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "polie" and "polies" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "poilues vs polies". 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 #92,693 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