sciurevssireConfusable pair

Which to use

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

#46,442
“sciure” frequency rank
#9,914
“sire” frequency rank
56356
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature sciure sire
Definition Parcelles qui tombent du bois ou de toute autre matière dure que l’on scie. Seigneur.

Where the eye mixes sciure and sire

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

6 ch
sciure
4 ch
sire

Look-alike desk: sciure vs sire

A purely visual mix-up. sciure (\sjyʁ\) and sire (\siʁ\) 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 2 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 56356, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

sciure is recorded at frequency rank #46,442, classified as anoun, pronounced \sjyʁ\. sire is at rank #9,914, tagged as anoun, pronounced \siʁ\.

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 56356, this pair ranks #121,594 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of sciure vs sire

Shared letters: eirs. Private to "sciure": cu. Private to "sire": -.

"sciure" · 6 letters · shape CCVVCV  ·  "sire" · 4 letters · shape CVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • sciurecsiure · scciure · scirue · sciuer · sciurre · scuire · sicure · ssciure
  • sireisre · sier · sirre · srie · ssire

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "sciure" for "sire" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (\sjyʁ\ versus \siʁ\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "sciure" or "sire"?
"sire" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #9,914 in our French list, against #46,442 for "sciure". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.

  • Full dictionary entry for "sciure" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "sire" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #121,594 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "sciure" and "sire" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "scindé vs sciure". 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 #121,594 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