soupapevssoupapesWhat's the difference?

Which to use

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

#32,602
“soupape” frequency rank
#31,745
“soupapes” frequency rank
64347
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature soupape soupapes
Definition Petit levier ou languette à ressort obturant la circulation de fluide dans une pompe ou un tuyau en deçà d’une pression donnée. Pluriel de soupape.

Same sound, different letters: soupape vs soupapes

Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 7 letters.

7 ch
soupape
8 ch
soupapes

Homophone desk: soupape vs soupapes

This is the hard kind. soupape and soupapes are pronounced identically (\su.pap\) and both work as anoun. Neither the ear nor the grammar will rescue you; only the meaning does, so the glosses below are the whole decision. They differ by 1 extra letter(s) - “soupape” sits inside “soupapes”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 64347, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

soupape is recorded at frequency rank #32,602, classified as anoun, pronounced \su.pap\. soupapes is at rank #31,745, tagged as anoun, pronounced \su.pap\.

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 64347, this pair ranks #77,490 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of soupape vs soupapes

Shared letters: aeopsu. Private to "soupape": -. Private to "soupapes": -.

"soupape" · 7 letters · shape CVVCVCV  ·  "soupapes" · 8 letters · shape CVVCVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • soupapeosupape · sopuape · souappe · soupaep · soupappe · souppae · souppape · ssoupape
  • soupapesosupapes · sopuapes · souappes · soupaeps · soupapess · soupappes · soupapse · souppaes

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "soupape" for "soupapes" ever safe?
No. They are pronounced the same (\su.pap\), which is exactly why they get swapped in writing, but the dictionary meanings above are different, and pronunciation is no guide here.
In ordinary French text, does "soupape" or "soupapes" show up more?
"soupapes" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #31,745 in our French list, against #32,602 for "soupape". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

You've separated the homophone pair "soupape" / "soupapes". Follow the links when you need the full entry or a neighbour that trips the same ear.

  • Full dictionary entry for "soupape" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "soupapes" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #77,490 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "soupape" and "soupapes" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "soupape vs soutane". 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 #77,490 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