Which to use
“sourd” and “surs” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #10,411
- “sourd” frequency rank
- #45,900
- “surs” frequency rank
- 56311
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | sourd | surs |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Dont l’acuité auditive est diminuée de façon importante ou totale, en parlant d’une personne ou d'un animal. | Masculin pluriel de l’adjectif sur. |
Where the eye mixes sourd and surs
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. sourd runs 5 letters (CVVCC) against surs's 4 (CVCC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Visual trap between sourd and surs
A purely visual mix-up. sourd (\suʁ\) and surs (\syʁ\) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 56311, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
sourd is recorded at frequency rank #10,411, classified as anadj, pronounced \suʁ\. surs is at rank #45,900, tagged as anadj, pronounced \syʁ\.
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 56311, this pair ranks #121,887 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of sourd vs surs
Shared letters: rsu. Private to "sourd": do. Private to "surs": -.
"sourd" · 5 letters · shape CVVCC · "surs" · 4 letters · shape CVCC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "sourd" and "surs" mean the same thing in a sentence?
In ordinary French text, does "sourd" or "surs" show up more?
What to do next
Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.
- Full dictionary entry for "sourd" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "surs" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #121,887 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "sourd" and "surs" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "surs vs suu". 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 #121,887 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.