secoursvsséjoursTell them apart

Which to use

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

#1,889
“secours” frequency rank
#12,489
“séjours” frequency rank
14378
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature secours séjours
Definition Aide, assistance dans le danger, dans le besoin. Pluriel de séjour.

Where the eye mixes secours and séjours

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence. secours and séjours follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCVVCC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

7 ch
secours
7 ch
séjours

Look-alike desk: secours vs séjours

A purely visual mix-up. secours (\sə.kuʁ\) and séjours (\se.ʒuʁ\) 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 14378, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

secours is recorded at frequency rank #1,889, classified as anoun, pronounced \sə.kuʁ\. séjours is at rank #12,489, tagged as anoun, pronounced \se.ʒuʁ\.

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 14378, this pair ranks #396,944 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of secours vs séjours

Shared letters: orsu. Private to "secours": ce. Private to "séjours": jé.

"secours" · 7 letters · shape CVCVVCC  ·  "séjours" · 7 letters · shape CVCVVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • secours ← escours · sceours · seccours · secorus · secourrs · secourss · secousr · secuors

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "secours" and "séjours" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\sə.kuʁ\ versus \se.ʒuʁ\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary French text, does "secours" or "séjours" show up more?
"secours" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #1,889 in our French list, against #12,489 for "séjours". 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 "secours" and "séjours" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "secours" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "séjours" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #396,944 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "secours" and "séjours" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "séjourna vs séjours". 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 #396,944 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