sirènevssirènesWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#12,866
“sirène” frequency rank
#15,762
“sirènes” frequency rank
28628
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature sirène sirènes
Definition Divinité gréco-romaine de la mer, représentée sous la forme d’une femme normale ou d’une femme-oiseau, qui passait pour attirer, par la douceur de son chant, les navigateurs sur les écueils. Pluriel de sirène.

Same sound, different letters: sirène vs sirènes

Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 6 letters. sirène runs 6 letters (CVCVCV) against sirènes's 7 (CVCVCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

6 ch
sirène
7 ch
sirènes

Ear matches; page differs - sirène and sirènes

This is the hard kind. sirène and sirènes are pronounced identically (\si.ʁɛn\) and both work as anoun. Neither the ear nor the grammar will rescue you; only the meaning does, so the glosses below are the whole decision. They differ by 1 extra letter(s) - “sirène” sits inside “sirènes”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 28628, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

sirène is recorded at frequency rank #12,866, classified as anoun, pronounced \si.ʁɛn\. sirènes is at rank #15,762, tagged as anoun, pronounced \si.ʁɛn\.

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 28628, this pair ranks #321,646 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of sirène vs sirènes

Shared letters: einrsè. Private to "sirène": -. Private to "sirènes": -.

"sirène" · 6 letters · shape CVCVCV  ·  "sirènes" · 7 letters · shape CVCVCVC

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "sirène" and "sirènes" be used interchangeably?
No. They are pronounced the same (\si.ʁɛn\), which is exactly why they get swapped in writing, but the dictionary meanings above are different, and pronunciation is no guide here.
In ordinary French text, does "sirène" or "sirènes" show up more?
"sirène" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #12,866 in our French list, against #15,762 for "sirènes". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "sirène" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "sirènes" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #321,646 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "sirène" and "sirènes" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "sirènes vs sires". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #321,646 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