suffiraientvssuffisaientTell them apart

Which to use

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

#48,809
“suffiraient” frequency rank
#44,756
“suffisaient” frequency rank
93565
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature suffiraient suffisaient
Definition Troisième personne du pluriel du conditionnel de suffire. Troisième personne du pluriel de l’imparfait de suffire.

Where the eye mixes suffiraient and suffisaient

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 10 letters in sequence. suffiraient and suffisaient follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCCVCVVVCC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

11 ch
suffiraient
11 ch
suffisaient

Visual trap between suffiraient and suffisaient

A purely visual mix-up. suffiraient (\sy.fi.ʁɛ\) and suffisaient (\sy.fi.zɛ\) 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 a single letter - r in “suffiraient” becomes s in “suffisaient”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 93565, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

suffiraient is recorded at frequency rank #48,809, classified as averb, pronounced \sy.fi.ʁɛ\. suffisaient is at rank #44,756, tagged as averb, pronounced \sy.fi.zɛ\.

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 93565, this pair ranks #2,175 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of suffiraient vs suffisaient

Shared letters: aefinstu. Private to "suffiraient": r. Private to "suffisaient": -.

"suffiraient" · 11 letters · shape CVCCVCVVVCC  ·  "suffisaient" · 11 letters · shape CVCCVCVVVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • suffiraientsfufiraient · ssuffiraient · suffiarient · suffiraeint · suffiraiennt · suffiraientt · suffiraietn · suffirainet
  • suffisaientsfufisaient · ssuffisaient · suffiasient · suffisaeint · suffisaiennt · suffisaientt · suffisaietn · suffisainet

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "suffiraient" for "suffisaient" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (\sy.fi.ʁɛ\ versus \sy.fi.zɛ\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary French text, does "suffiraient" or "suffisaient" show up more?
"suffisaient" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #44,756 in our French list, against #48,809 for "suffiraient". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Eye-level mix-up between "suffiraient" and "suffisaient" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "suffiraient" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "suffisaient" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #2,175 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "suffiraient" and "suffisaient" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "suffiraient vs suffisament". 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 #2,175 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