Which to use
“rayer” is a verb and “rayure” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #24,007
- “rayer” frequency rank
- #46,397
- “rayure” frequency rank
- 70404
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | rayer | rayure |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Marquer d’une ou de plusieurs raies, | Entaille, trace, éraflure faite sur une surface polie par un objet contondant. |
Where the eye mixes rayer and rayure
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. rayer runs 5 letters (CVVVC) against rayure's 6 (CVVVCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Look-alike desk: rayer vs rayure
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: rayer is \ʁe.je\ while rayure is \ʁe.jyʁ\. 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 (verb vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 70404, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
rayer is recorded at frequency rank #24,007, classified as averb, pronounced \ʁe.je\. rayure is at rank #46,397, tagged as anoun, pronounced \ʁe.jyʁ\.
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 70404, this pair ranks #51,424 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of rayer vs rayure
Shared letters: aery. Private to "rayer": -. Private to "rayure": u.
"rayer" · 5 letters · shape CVVVC · "rayure" · 6 letters · shape CVVVCV
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Can "rayer" and "rayure" be used interchangeably?
In ordinary French text, does "rayer" or "rayure" show up more?
What to do next
Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.
- Full dictionary entry for "rayer" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "rayure" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #51,424 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "rayer" and "rayure" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "raclure vs rayure". 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 #51,424 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.