synvssyncTell them apart

Which to use

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

#39,569
“syn” frequency rank
#38,061
“sync” frequency rank
77630
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature syn sync
Definition Fils. Synchronisation.

Where the eye mixes syn and sync

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.

3 ch
syn
4 ch
sync

Look-alike desk: syn vs sync

A purely visual mix-up. syn (\sɨn\) and sync (\ˈsɪŋk\) 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 extra letter(s) - “syn” sits inside “sync”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 77630, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

syn is recorded at frequency rank #39,569, classified as anoun, pronounced \sɨn\. sync is at rank #38,061, tagged as anoun, pronounced \ˈsɪŋk\.

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 77630, this pair ranks #27,839 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of syn vs sync

Shared letters: nsy. Private to "syn": -. Private to "sync": c.

"syn" · 3 letters · shape CVC  ·  "sync" · 4 letters · shape CVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • syncsnyc · ssync · sycn · syncc · synnc · syync · ysnc

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "syn" and "sync" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\sɨn\ versus \ˈsɪŋk\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary French text, does "syn" or "sync" show up more?
"sync" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #38,061 in our French list, against #39,569 for "syn". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "syn" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "sync" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #27,839 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "syn" and "sync" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "suu vs syn". 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 #27,839 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