Which to use
“souffler” is a verb and “soufflet” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #11,667
- “souffler” frequency rank
- #34,757
- “soufflet” frequency rank
- 46424
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | souffler | soufflet |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Pousser de l’air hors de la bouche. | Instrument servant à souffler, à faire du vent. |
Where the eye mixes souffler and soufflet
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 7 letters in sequence. souffler and soufflet follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVVCCCVC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.
Visual trap between souffler and soufflet
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: souffler is \su.fle\ while soufflet is \su.flɛ\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by a single letter - r in “souffler” becomes t in “soufflet”, and the parts of speech differ too (verb vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 46424, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
souffler is recorded at frequency rank #11,667, classified as averb, pronounced \su.fle\. soufflet is at rank #34,757, tagged as anoun, pronounced \su.flɛ\.
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 46424, this pair ranks #195,050 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of souffler vs soufflet
Shared letters: eflosu. Private to "souffler": r. Private to "soufflet": t.
"souffler" · 8 letters · shape CVVCCCVC · "soufflet" · 8 letters · shape CVVCCCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "souffler" for "soufflet" ever safe?
Which is more common, "souffler" or "soufflet"?
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 "souffler" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "soufflet" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #195,050 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "souffler" and "soufflet" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "soufflent vs soufflet". 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 #195,050 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.