puisévspuitsWhat's the difference?

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

Which to use

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

#32,135
“puisé” frequency rank
#5,282
“puits” frequency rank
37417
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature puisé puits
Definition Participe passé masculin singulier de puiser. 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.

Where the spellings diverge

Shared letters are muted; the letters that actually set puisé and puits apart are highlighted. They share 4 letters in sequence, which is exactly why the eye skips the difference.

5 ch
puisé
5 ch
puits

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: puisé is \pɥi.ze\ while puits is \pɥi\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (verb vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 37417, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

puisé is recorded at frequency rank #32,135, classified as averb, pronounced \pɥi.ze\. 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 37417, this pair ranks #262,662 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of puisé vs puits

Shared letters: ipsu. Private to "puisé": é. Private to "puits": t.

"puisé" · 5 letters · shape CVVCV  ·  "puits" · 5 letters · shape CVVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • puitspiuts · ppuits · puist · puitss · puitts · putis · upits

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "puisé" and "puits" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "puisé" is a verb and "puits" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "puisé" or "puits"?
"puits" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #5,282 in our French list, against #32,135 for "puisé". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

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

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list