Which to use
“shark” and “sharks” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #35,275
- “shark” frequency rank
- #28,348
- “sharks” frequency rank
- 63623
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | shark | sharks |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Requin, squale. | Pluriel de shark. |
Where the eye mixes shark and sharks
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence. shark runs 5 letters (CCVCC) against sharks's 6 (CCVCCC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Look-alike desk: shark vs sharks
A purely visual mix-up. shark (\ˈʃɑɹk\) and sharks (\ˈʃɑɹks\) 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 1 extra letter(s) - “shark” sits inside “sharks”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 63623, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
shark is recorded at frequency rank #35,275, classified as anoun, pronounced \ˈʃɑɹk\. sharks is at rank #28,348, tagged as anoun, pronounced \ˈʃɑɹks\.
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 63623, this pair ranks #81,058 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of shark vs sharks
Shared letters: ahkrs. Private to "shark": -. Private to "sharks": -.
"shark" · 5 letters · shape CCVCC · "sharks" · 6 letters · shape CCVCCC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "shark" and "sharks" mean the same thing in a sentence?
Which is more common, "shark" or "sharks"?
After this comparison
Eye-level mix-up between "shark" and "sharks" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.
- Full dictionary entry for "shark" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "sharks" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #81,058 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "shark" and "sharks" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "scar vs shark". 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 #81,058 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.