portonsvsportsConfusable pair

Quick tell: portons is a verb, ports is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“portons” is a verb and “ports” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#23,983
“portons” frequency rank
#6,642
“ports” frequency rank
30625
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature portons ports
Definition Première personne du pluriel du présent de l’indicatif de porter. Pluriel de port.

Where the eye mixes portons and ports

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence.

7 ch
portons
5 ch
ports

Look-alike desk: portons vs ports

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: portons is \pɔʁ.tɔ̃\ while ports is \pɔʁ\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 2 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (verb vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 30625, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

portons is recorded at frequency rank #23,983, classified as averb, pronounced \pɔʁ.tɔ̃\. ports is at rank #6,642, tagged as anoun, pronounced \pɔʁ\.

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 30625, this pair ranks #309,021 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of portons vs ports

Shared letters: oprst. Private to "portons": n. Private to "ports": -.

"portons" · 7 letters · shape CVCCVCC  ·  "ports" · 5 letters · shape CVCCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • portonsoprtons · porotns · porrtons · portnos · portonns · portonss · portosn · porttons
  • portsoprts · porrts · porst · portss · portts · potrs · pports · prots

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "portons" and "ports" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "portons" is a verb and "ports" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "portons" vs "ports" - which ranks higher?
"ports" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #6,642 in our French list, against #23,983 for "portons". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.

  • Full dictionary entry for "portons" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "ports" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #309,021 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "portons" and "ports" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "parions vs portons". 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 #309,021 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