soldevssourdeConfusable pair

Which to use

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

#5,925
“solde” frequency rank
#14,569
“sourde” frequency rank
20494
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature solde sourde
Definition Paie octroyée par l’armée à un de ses membres militaires ou, par extension, un de ses employés civils. Femme sourde.

Where the eye mixes solde and sourde

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence.

5 ch
solde
6 ch
sourde

Why the eye confuses solde with sourde

A purely visual mix-up. solde (\sɔld\) and sourde (\suʁd\) 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 20494, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

solde is recorded at frequency rank #5,925, classified as anoun, pronounced \sɔld\. sourde is at rank #14,569, tagged as anoun, pronounced \suʁd\.

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 20494, this pair ranks #367,999 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of solde vs sourde

Shared letters: deos. Private to "solde": l. Private to "sourde": ru.

"solde" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV  ·  "sourde" · 6 letters · shape CVVCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • soldeoslde · slode · sodle · soldde · soled · sollde · ssolde
  • sourdeosurde · sorude · soudre · sourdde · soured · sourrde · ssourde · suorde

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "solde" for "sourde" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (\sɔld\ versus \suʁd\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "solde" or "sourde"?
"solde" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #5,925 in our French list, against #14,569 for "sourde". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Eye-level mix-up between "solde" and "sourde" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "solde" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "sourde" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #367,999 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "solde" and "sourde" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "souabe vs sourde". 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 #367,999 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