Which to use
“shift” and “ship” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #32,597
- “shift” frequency rank
- #23,693
- “ship” frequency rank
- 56290
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | shift | ship |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Période de travail effectué par une équipe. | Couple principalement non officiel ou non canonique entre des personnages. |
Where the eye mixes shift and ship
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.
Look-alike desk: shift vs ship
A purely visual mix-up. shift (\ʃift\) and ship (\ʃip\) 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 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 56290, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
shift is recorded at frequency rank #32,597, classified as anoun, pronounced \ʃift\. ship is at rank #23,693, tagged as anoun, pronounced \ʃip\.
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 56290, this pair ranks #122,019 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of shift vs ship
Shared letters: his. Private to "shift": ft. Private to "ship": p.
"shift" · 5 letters · shape CCVCC · "ship" · 4 letters · shape CCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "shift" and "ship" mean the same thing in a sentence?
In ordinary French text, does "shift" or "ship" show up more?
What to do next
Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.
- Full dictionary entry for "shift" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "ship" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #122,019 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "shift" and "ship" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "sheet vs shift". 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 #122,019 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.