skinvsspinTell them apart

Which to use

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

#20,576
“skin” frequency rank
#17,275
“spin” frequency rank
37851
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature skin spin
Definition Habillage, couche qui s’applique à une interface de jeu ou de programme pour en modifier l’apparence. Propriété quantique intrinsèque associée à chaque particule, qui est caractéristique de la nature de la particule, au même titre que sa masse et sa charge électrique, et qui s’apparente à la quantité de mouvement angulaire sans l’être.

Where the eye mixes skin and spin

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.

4 ch
skin
4 ch
spin

Visual trap between skin and spin

A purely visual mix-up. skin (\skin\) and spin (\spin\) 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 a single letter - k in “skin” becomes p in “spin”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 37851, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

skin is recorded at frequency rank #20,576, classified as anoun, pronounced \skin\. spin is at rank #17,275, tagged as anoun, pronounced \spin\.

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 37851, this pair ranks #259,520 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of skin vs spin

Shared letters: ins. Private to "skin": k. Private to "spin": p.

"skin" · 4 letters · shape CCVC  ·  "spin" · 4 letters · shape CCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • skinksin · sikn · skinn · skkin · skni · sskin
  • spinpsin · sipn · spinn · spni · sppin · sspin

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "skin" and "spin" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\skin\ versus \spin\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "skin" or "spin"?
"spin" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #17,275 in our French list, against #20,576 for "skin". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.

  • Full dictionary entry for "skin" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "spin" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #259,520 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "skin" and "spin" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "skin vs spi". 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 #259,520 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