sœursvssourisWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#4,383
“sœurs” frequency rank
#2,965
“souris” frequency rank
7348
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature sœurs souris
Definition Pluriel de sœur. Petit rongeur de la famille des muridés.

Where the eye mixes sœurs and souris

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence.

5 ch
sœurs
6 ch
souris

Visual trap between sœurs and souris

A purely visual mix-up. sœurs (\sœʁ\) and souris (\su.ʁi\) 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 7348, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

sœurs is recorded at frequency rank #4,383, classified as anoun, pronounced \sœʁ\. souris is at rank #2,965, tagged as anoun, pronounced \su.ʁi\.

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 7348, this pair ranks #423,429 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of sœurs vs souris

Shared letters: rsu. Private to "sœurs": œ. Private to "souris": io.

"sœurs" · 5 letters · shape CVVCC  ·  "souris" · 6 letters · shape CVVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • sourisosuris · soruis · souirs · souriss · sourris · soursi · ssouris · suoris

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "sœurs" for "souris" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (\sœʁ\ versus \su.ʁi\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "sœurs" or "souris"?
"souris" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #2,965 in our French list, against #4,383 for "sœurs". 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 "sœurs" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "souris" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #423,429 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "sœurs" and "souris" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "sofres vs souris". 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 #423,429 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