sukvssumoTell them apart

Which to use

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

#47,626
“suk” frequency rank
#45,896
“sumo” frequency rank
93522
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature suk sumo
Definition Nœud dans le bois. Sport de lutte japonais, consistant à faire sortir l’adversaire hors d’un cercle marquant la zone de lutte ou à le faire tomber.

Where the eye mixes suk and sumo

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence. suk runs 3 letters (CVC) against sumo's 4 (CVCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

3 ch
suk
4 ch
sumo

Visual trap between suk and sumo

A purely visual mix-up. suk (\sʊk\) and sumo (\sy.mo\) 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 93522, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

suk is recorded at frequency rank #47,626, classified as anoun, pronounced \sʊk\. sumo is at rank #45,896, tagged as anoun, pronounced \sy.mo\.

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 93522, this pair ranks #2,220 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of suk vs sumo

Shared letters: su. Private to "suk": k. Private to "sumo": mo.

"suk" · 3 letters · shape CVC  ·  "sumo" · 4 letters · shape CVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • sumo ← smuo · ssumo · summo · suom · usmo

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "suk" for "sumo" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (\sʊk\ versus \sy.mo\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "suk" or "sumo"?
"sumo" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #45,896 in our French list, against #47,626 for "suk". 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 "suk" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "sumo" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #2,220 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "suk" and "sumo" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "suk 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 #2,220 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