seillevssigWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: seille is a noun, sig is a pronoun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“seille” is a noun and “sig” is a pronoun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#45,308
“seille” frequency rank
#22,704
“sig” frequency rank
68012
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature seille sig
Definition Bassine, munie d’oreilles dans lesquelles on passe une corde en guise d’anse et qui sert à transporter les liquides, en particulier, le mout tiré du pressoir. Se (pronom réflexif).

Same sound, different letters: seille vs sig

Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 2 letters. seille runs 6 letters (CVVCCV) against sig's 3 (CVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

6 ch
seille
3 ch
sig

Ear matches; page differs - seille and sig

Say them out loud and nothing separates them: seille and sig carry the same recorded pronunciation, \sɛj\. Grammar is what tells them apart: one is anoun, the other apronoun, so most sentences will only accept one of them. They differ by 3 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 68012, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

seille is recorded at frequency rank #45,308, classified as anoun, pronounced \sɛj\. sig is at rank #22,704, tagged as apron, pronounced \sɛj\.

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 68012, this pair ranks #60,978 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of seille vs sig

Shared letters: is. Private to "seille": el. Private to "sig": g.

"seille" · 6 letters · shape CVVCCV  ·  "sig" · 3 letters · shape CVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • seille ← esille · seile · seilel · selile · sielle · sseille

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "seille" and "sig" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "seille" is a noun and "sig" a pronoun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary French text, does "seille" or "sig" show up more?
"sig" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #22,704 in our French list, against #45,308 for "seille". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

"seille" and "sig" share a sound, keep the gloss open, then jump to the headword or a nearby trap.

  • Full dictionary entry for "seille" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "sig" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #60,978 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "seille" and "sig" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "seille vs skill". 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 #60,978 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