Which to use
“public” and “publics” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #382
- “public” frequency rank
- #1,234
- “publics” frequency rank
- 1616
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | public | publics |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Qui appartient au peuple dans son entier. | Masculin pluriel de public. |
Same sound, different letters: public vs publics
Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 6 letters. public runs 6 letters (CVCCVC) against publics's 7 (CVCCVCC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Ear matches; page differs - public and publics
This is the hard kind. public and publics are pronounced identically (\py.blik\) 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) - “public” sits inside “publics”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 1616, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
public is recorded at frequency rank #382, classified as anadj, pronounced \py.blik\. publics is at rank #1,234, tagged as anadj, pronounced \py.blik\.
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 1616, this pair ranks #437,707 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of public vs publics
Shared letters: bcilpu. Private to "public": -. Private to "publics": s.
"public" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC · "publics" · 7 letters · shape CVCCVCC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Can "public" and "publics" be used interchangeably?
Frequency check: "public" vs "publics" - which ranks higher?
After this comparison
You've separated the homophone pair "public" / "publics". Follow the links when you need the full entry or a neighbour that trips the same ear.
- Full dictionary entry for "public" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "publics" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #437,707 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "public" and "publics" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "pubis vs publics". 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 #437,707 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.