thaïsvstheirTell them apart

Quick tell: thaïs is a adjective, their is a determiner, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“thaïs” is an adjective and “their” is a determiner - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#42,083
“thaïs” frequency rank
#16,023
“their” frequency rank
58106
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature thaïs their
Definition Masculin pluriel de thaï. Leur, leurs.

Where the eye mixes thaïs and their

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.

5 ch
thaïs
5 ch
their

Visual trap between thaïs and their

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: thaïs is \taj\ while their is \ðɛə(ɹ)\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 3 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (adjective vs determiner), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 58106, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

thaïs is recorded at frequency rank #42,083, classified as anadj, pronounced \taj\. their is at rank #16,023, tagged as adet, pronounced \ðɛə(ɹ)\.

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 58106, this pair ranks #110,992 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of thaïs vs their

Shared letters: ht. Private to "thaïs": asï. Private to "their": eir.

"thaïs" · 5 letters · shape CCVCC  ·  "their" · 5 letters · shape CCVVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • theirhteir · tehir · theirr · theri · thheir · thier · ttheir

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "thaïs" and "their" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "thaïs" is an adjective and "their" a determiner, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary French text, does "thaïs" or "their" show up more?
"their" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #16,023 in our French list, against #42,083 for "thaïs". 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 "thaïs" and "their" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "thaïs" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "their" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #110,992 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "thaïs" and "their" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "thaïs vs thons". 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 #110,992 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