poursuitevspoursuitesWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#3,634
“poursuite” frequency rank
#7,219
“poursuites” frequency rank
10853
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature poursuite poursuites
Definition Action de celui ou de celle qui poursuit un homme ou un animal, qui court après pour l’atteindre, pour le prendre. Pluriel de poursuite.

Same sound, different letters: poursuite vs poursuites

Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 9 letters.

9 ch
poursuite
10 ch
poursuites

Same sound, different spelling - poursuite / poursuites

This is the hard kind. poursuite and poursuites are pronounced identically (\puʁ.sɥit\) 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) - “poursuite” sits inside “poursuites”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 10853, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

poursuite is recorded at frequency rank #3,634, classified as anoun, pronounced \puʁ.sɥit\. poursuites is at rank #7,219, tagged as anoun, pronounced \puʁ.sɥit\.

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 10853, this pair ranks #411,421 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of poursuite vs poursuites

Shared letters: eioprstu. Private to "poursuite": -. Private to "poursuites": -.

"poursuite" · 9 letters · shape CVVCCVVCV  ·  "poursuites" · 10 letters · shape CVVCCVVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • poursuiteopursuite · porusuite · pourrsuite · poursiute · pourssuite · poursuiet · poursuitte · poursutie
  • poursuitesopursuites · porusuites · pourrsuites · poursiutes · pourssuites · poursuiets · poursuitess · poursuitse

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "poursuite" for "poursuites" ever safe?
No. They are pronounced the same (\puʁ.sɥit\), which is exactly why they get swapped in writing, but the dictionary meanings above are different, and pronunciation is no guide here.
Which is more common, "poursuite" or "poursuites"?
"poursuite" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #3,634 in our French list, against #7,219 for "poursuites". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

You've separated the homophone pair "poursuite" / "poursuites". Follow the links when you need the full entry or a neighbour that trips the same ear.

  • Full dictionary entry for "poursuite" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "poursuites" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #411,421 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "poursuite" and "poursuites" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "poursuites vs poursuivez". 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 #411,421 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