pontvsPOSTell them apart

Which to use

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

#1,452
“pont” frequency rank
#23,984
“POS” frequency rank
25436
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature pont POS
Definition Construction élevée d’un bord à l’autre d’une rivière, d’un ruisseau, d’un fossé pour permettre de les traverser. Document d’urbanisme représentant zone par zone la vocation d’utilisation du sol et l’ensemble des contraintes administratives réglementant cette utilisation.

Where the eye mixes pont and POS

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.

4 ch
pont
3 ch
POS

Look-alike desk: pont vs POS

A purely visual mix-up. pont (\pɔ̃\) and POS (\pɔs\) 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 25436, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

pont is recorded at frequency rank #1,452, classified as anoun, pronounced \pɔ̃\. POS is at rank #23,984, tagged as anoun, pronounced \pɔs\.

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 25436, this pair ranks #340,894 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of pont vs POS

Shared letters: op. Private to "pont": nt. Private to "POS": s.

"pont" · 4 letters · shape CVCC  ·  "POS" · 3 letters · shape CVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • pontopnt · pnot · ponnt · pontt · potn · ppont

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "pont" and "POS" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently (\pɔ̃\ versus \pɔs\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "pont" vs "POS" - which ranks higher?
"pont" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #1,452 in our French list, against #23,984 for "POS". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Useful next steps

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "pont" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "POS" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #340,894 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "pont" and "POS" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "pio vs POS". 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 #340,894 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