sautsvsspotsWhat's the difference?

Which to use

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

#17,000
“sauts” frequency rank
#19,161
“spots” frequency rank
36161
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature sauts spots
Definition Pluriel de saut. Pluriel de spot.

Where the eye mixes sauts and spots

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.

5 ch
sauts
5 ch
spots

Why the eye confuses sauts with spots

A purely visual mix-up. sauts (\so\) and spots (\spɔt\) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 36161, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

sauts is recorded at frequency rank #17,000, classified as anoun, pronounced \so\. spots is at rank #19,161, tagged as anoun, pronounced \spɔt\.

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 36161, this pair ranks #271,585 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of sauts vs spots

Shared letters: st. Private to "sauts": au. Private to "spots": op.

"sauts" · 5 letters · shape CVVCC  ·  "spots" · 5 letters · shape CCVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • sautsasuts · satus · saust · sautss · sautts · ssauts · suats
  • spotssopts · spost · spotss · spotts · sppots · sptos · sspots

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "sauts" and "spots" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\so\ versus \spɔt\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "sauts" vs "spots" - which ranks higher?
"sauts" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #17,000 in our French list, against #19,161 for "spots". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "sauts" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "spots" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #271,585 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "sauts" and "spots" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "shops vs spots". 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 #271,585 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