sonsvssoyaWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#4,287
“sons” frequency rank
#49,368
“soya” frequency rank
53655
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature sons soya
Definition Pluriel de son. Sauce de soja.

Where the eye mixes sons and soya

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.

4 ch
sons
4 ch
soya

Look-alike desk: sons vs soya

A purely visual mix-up. sons (\sɔ̃\) and soya (\sɔ.ja\) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 53655, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

sons is recorded at frequency rank #4,287, classified as anoun, pronounced \sɔ̃\. soya is at rank #49,368, tagged as anoun, pronounced \sɔ.ja\.

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 53655, this pair ranks #139,275 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of sons vs soya

Shared letters: os. Private to "sons": n. Private to "soya": ay.

"sons" · 4 letters · shape CVCC  ·  "soya" · 4 letters · shape CVVV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • sonsosns · snos · sonns · sonss · sosn · ssons
  • soyaosya · soay · soyya · ssoya · syoa

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "sons" and "soya" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently (\sɔ̃\ versus \sɔ.ja\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "sons" or "soya"?
"sons" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #4,287 in our French list, against #49,368 for "soya". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

What to do next

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "sons" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "soya" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #139,275 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "sons" and "soya" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Soraya vs soya". 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 #139,275 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