soûlervssoupesWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: soûler is a verb, soupes is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“soûler” is a verb and “soupes” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#39,547
“soûler” frequency rank
#29,156
“soupes” frequency rank
68703
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature soûler soupes
Definition Rassasier jusqu’à l’excès, gorger de vin, de viande. Pluriel de soupe.

Where the eye mixes soûler and soupes

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. soûler and soupes follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVVCVC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

6 ch
soûler
6 ch
soupes

Look-alike desk: soûler vs soupes

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: soûler is \su.le\ while soupes is \sup\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 3 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (verb vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 68703, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

soûler is recorded at frequency rank #39,547, classified as averb, pronounced \su.le\. soupes is at rank #29,156, tagged as anoun, pronounced \sup\.

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 68703, this pair ranks #58,039 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of soûler vs soupes

Shared letters: eos. Private to "soûler": lrû. Private to "soupes": pu.

"soûler" · 6 letters · shape CVVCVC  ·  "soupes" · 6 letters · shape CVVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • soupesosupes · sopues · soueps · soupess · souppes · soupse · ssoupes · suopes

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "soûler" and "soupes" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "soûler" is a verb and "soupes" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary French text, does "soûler" or "soupes" show up more?
"soupes" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #29,156 in our French list, against #39,547 for "soûler". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "soûler" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "soupes" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #58,039 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "soûler" and "soupes" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "soûler vs souleva". 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 #58,039 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