sciervssoiesWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: scier is a verb, soies is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“scier” is a verb and “soies” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#44,177
“scier” frequency rank
#39,044
“soies” frequency rank
83221
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature scier soies
Definition Couper, fendre avec une scie. Pluriel de soie.

Where the eye mixes scier and soies

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. scier (CCVVC) and soies (CVVVC) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.

5 ch
scier
5 ch
soies

Visual trap between scier and soies

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: scier is \sje\ while soies is \swa\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (verb vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 83221, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

scier is recorded at frequency rank #44,177, classified as averb, pronounced \sje\. soies is at rank #39,044, tagged as anoun, pronounced \swa\.

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 83221, this pair ranks #15,229 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of scier vs soies

Shared letters: eis. Private to "scier": cr. Private to "soies": o.

"scier" · 5 letters · shape CCVVC  ·  "soies" · 5 letters · shape CVVVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • scier ← csier · sccier · sceir · scierr · scire · sicer · sscier
  • soies ← osies · sioes · soeis · soiess · ssoies

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "scier" and "soies" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "scier" is a verb and "soies" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "scier" vs "soies" - which ranks higher?
"soies" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #39,044 in our French list, against #44,177 for "scier". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "scier" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "soies" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #15,229 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "scier" and "soies" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "scier vs soler". 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 #15,229 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