puisvspuitsWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: puis is a adverb, puits is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“puis” is an adverb and “puits” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#172
“puis” frequency rank
#5,282
“puits” frequency rank
5454
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature puis puits
Definition (adverbe de temps) Permet l’enchaînement chronologique d’évènements. Trou qui s’enfonce dans le sol pour tirer de l’eau, du pétrole, du gaz naturel, ou tout autre fluide qui se trouve en profondeur.

Same sound, different letters: puis vs puits

Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 4 letters.

4 ch
puis
5 ch
puits

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

Say them out loud and nothing separates them: puis and puits carry the same recorded pronunciation, \pɥi\. Grammar is what tells them apart: one is anadverb, the other anoun, so most sentences will only accept one of them. They differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 5454, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

puis is recorded at frequency rank #172, classified as anadv, pronounced \pɥi\. puits is at rank #5,282, tagged as anoun, pronounced \pɥi\.

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 5454, this pair ranks #428,974 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of puis vs puits

Shared letters: ipsu. Private to "puis": -. Private to "puits": t.

"puis" · 4 letters · shape CVVC  ·  "puits" · 5 letters · shape CVVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • puispius · ppuis · puiss · pusi · upis
  • puitspiuts · ppuits · puist · puitss · puitts · putis · upits

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "puis" and "puits" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "puis" is an adverb and "puits" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "puis" or "puits"?
"puis" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #172 in our French list, against #5,282 for "puits". 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 "puis" and "puits". Here's where to go from here.

  • Full dictionary entry for "puis" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "puits" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #428,974 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "puis" and "puits" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "peins vs puits". 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