Which to use
“telles” is an adjective and “tôles” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #1,977
- “telles” frequency rank
- #36,633
- “tôles” frequency rank
- 38610
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | telles | tôles |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Féminin pluriel de tel. | Pluriel de tôle. |
Where the eye mixes telles and tôles
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. telles runs 6 letters (CVCCVC) against tôles's 5 (CVCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Why the eye confuses telles with tôles
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: telles is \tɛl\ while tôles is \tol\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (adjective vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 38610, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
telles is recorded at frequency rank #1,977, classified as anadj, pronounced \tɛl\. tôles is at rank #36,633, tagged as anoun, pronounced \tol\.
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 38610, this pair ranks #254,061 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of telles vs tôles
Shared letters: elst. Private to "telles": -. Private to "tôles": ô.
"telles" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC · "tôles" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
- telles ← etlles · telels · teles · telless · tellse · tleles · ttelles
Frequently Asked Questions
Can "telles" and "tôles" be used interchangeably?
In ordinary French text, does "telles" or "tôles" show up more?
After this comparison
Eye-level mix-up between "telles" and "tôles" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.
- Full dictionary entry for "telles" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "tôles" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #254,061 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "telles" and "tôles" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "tôles vs trônes". 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 #254,061 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.