soumisvssouriWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: soumis is a adjective, souri is a verb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“soumis” is an adjective and “souri” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#2,645
“soumis” frequency rank
#19,687
“souri” frequency rank
22332
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature soumis souri
Definition Qui est disposé à l’obéissance ou qui en a pris le parti après avoir résisté. Participe passé masculin singulier de sourire.

Where the eye mixes soumis and souri

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. soumis runs 6 letters (CVVCVC) against souri's 5 (CVVCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

6 ch
soumis
5 ch
souri

Why the eye confuses soumis with souri

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: soumis is \su.mi\ while souri is \su.ʁi\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (adjective vs verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 22332, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

soumis is recorded at frequency rank #2,645, classified as anadj, pronounced \su.mi\. souri is at rank #19,687, tagged as averb, pronounced \su.ʁi\.

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 22332, this pair ranks #358,554 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of soumis vs souri

Shared letters: iosu. Private to "soumis": m. Private to "souri": r.

"soumis" · 6 letters · shape CVVCVC  ·  "souri" · 5 letters · shape CVVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • soumis ← osumis · somuis · souims · soumiss · soummis · soumsi · ssoumis · suomis
  • souri ← osuri · sorui · souir · sourri · ssouri · suori

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "soumis" and "souri" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "soumis" is an adjective and "souri" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "soumis" or "souri"?
"soumis" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #2,645 in our French list, against #19,687 for "souri". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "soumis" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "souri" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #358,554 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "soumis" and "souri" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Sabri vs souri". 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 #358,554 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