pourvsproudWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: pour is a preposition, proud is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“pour” is a preposition and “proud” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#19
“pour” frequency rank
#45,806
“proud” frequency rank
45825
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature pour proud
Definition Au motif de ; dans le but de ; afin de ; à destination de. Fier.

Where the eye mixes pour and proud

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.

4 ch
pour
5 ch
proud

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: pour is \puʁ\ while proud is \pɹaʊd\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (preposition vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 45825, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

pour is recorded at frequency rank #19, classified as aprep, pronounced \puʁ\. proud is at rank #45,806, tagged as anadj, pronounced \pɹaʊd\.

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 45825, this pair ranks #199,745 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of pour vs proud

Shared letters: opru. Private to "pour": -. Private to "proud": d.

"pour" · 4 letters · shape CVVC  ·  "proud" · 5 letters · shape CCVVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • pouropur · poru · pourr · ppour · puor
  • proudporud · pproud · produ · proudd · prroud · pruod · rpoud

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "pour" and "proud" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "pour" is a preposition and "proud" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "pour" or "proud"?
"pour" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #19 in our French list, against #45,806 for "proud". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

What to do next

You've compared "pour" and "proud". Here's where to go from here.

  • Full dictionary entry for "pour" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "proud" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #199,745 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "pour" and "proud" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "proud vs prude". 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

PlainSpell is a reference corpus, not spelling advice. Verify unusual forms in context.

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list