raisvsravinWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#37,509
“rais” frequency rank
#19,382
“ravin” frequency rank
56891
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature rais ravin
Definition Ancienne orthographe de rai, figurant au Dictionnaire de l'Académie française jusqu’en 1878. Forte dépression de terrain ; vallon étroit et raide.

Where the eye mixes rais and ravin

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. rais runs 4 letters (CVVC) against ravin's 5 (CVCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

4 ch
rais
5 ch
ravin

Visual trap between rais and ravin

A purely visual mix-up. rais (\ʁɛ\) and ravin (\ʁa.vɛ̃\) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 56891, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

rais is recorded at frequency rank #37,509, classified as anoun, pronounced \ʁɛ\. ravin is at rank #19,382, tagged as anoun, pronounced \ʁa.vɛ̃\.

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 56891, this pair ranks #118,295 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of rais vs ravin

Shared letters: air. Private to "rais": s. Private to "ravin": nv.

"rais" · 4 letters · shape CVVC  ·  "ravin" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • rais ← raiss · rasi · rias · rrais
  • ravin ← arvin · raivn · ravinn · ravni · ravvin · rravin · rvain

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "rais" and "ravin" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently (\ʁɛ\ versus \ʁa.vɛ̃\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "rais" or "ravin"?
"ravin" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #19,382 in our French list, against #37,509 for "rais". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Eye-level mix-up between "rais" and "ravin" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "rais" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "ravin" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #118,295 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "rais" and "ravin" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "rais vs Rhys". 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 #118,295 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