ThiersvstiersWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: Thiers is a name, tiers is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“Thiers” is a name and “tiers” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#17,576
“Thiers” frequency rank
#1,643
“tiers” frequency rank
19219
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature Thiers tiers
Definition Nom de famille français. Partie d’une unité qui est subdivisée en trois parties égales ; résultat de la division par trois. 1/3.

Same sound, different letters: Thiers vs tiers

Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 5 letters. Thiers runs 6 letters (CCVVCC) against tiers's 5 (CVVCC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

6 ch
Thiers
5 ch
tiers

Ear matches; page differs - Thiers and tiers

Say them out loud and nothing separates them: Thiers and tiers carry the same recorded pronunciation, \tjɛʁ\. Grammar is what tells them apart: one is aname, the other anoun, so most sentences will only accept one of them. They differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 19219, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

Thiers is recorded at frequency rank #17,576, classified as aname, pronounced \tjɛʁ\. tiers is at rank #1,643, tagged as anoun, pronounced \tjɛʁ\.

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 19219, this pair ranks #374,346 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of Thiers vs tiers

Shared letters: eirst. Private to "Thiers": h. Private to "tiers": -.

"Thiers" · 6 letters · shape CCVVCC  ·  "tiers" · 5 letters · shape CVVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • Thiers ← htiers · theirs · thhiers · thierrs · thierss · thiesr · thires · tihers
  • tiers ← iters · teirs · tierrs · tierss · tiesr · tires · ttiers

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "Thiers" and "tiers" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "Thiers" is a name and "tiers" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary French text, does "Thiers" or "tiers" show up more?
"tiers" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #1,643 in our French list, against #17,576 for "Thiers". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

After this comparison

You've separated the homophone pair "Thiers" / "tiers". Follow the links when you need the full entry or a neighbour that trips the same ear.

  • Full dictionary entry for "Thiers" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "tiers" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #374,346 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "Thiers" and "tiers" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "théière vs Thiers". 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 #374,346 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