ravivsrayWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: ravi is a adjective, ray is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“ravi” is an adjective and “ray” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#7,362
“ravi” frequency rank
#4,886
“ray” frequency rank
12248
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature ravi ray
Definition Enchanté ; très content. Culture sur brûlis en Asie.

Where the eye mixes ravi and ray

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.

4 ch
ravi
3 ch
ray

Visual trap between ravi and ray

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: ravi is \ʁa.vi\ while ray is \ʁɛ\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (adjective vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 12248, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

ravi is recorded at frequency rank #7,362, classified as anadj, pronounced \ʁa.vi\. ray is at rank #4,886, tagged as anoun, pronounced \ʁɛ\.

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 12248, this pair ranks #406,026 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of ravi vs ray

Shared letters: ar. Private to "ravi": iv. Private to "ray": y.

"ravi" · 4 letters · shape CVCV  ·  "ray" · 3 letters · shape CVV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • raviarvi · raiv · ravvi · rravi

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "ravi" for "ray" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "ravi" is an adjective and "ray" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "ravi" or "ray"?
"ray" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #4,886 in our French list, against #7,362 for "ravi". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "ravi" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "ray" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #406,026 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "ravi" and "ray" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "RAMQ vs ravi". 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 #406,026 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