thonsvstonWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: thons is a noun, ton is a determiner, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“thons” is a noun and “ton” is a determiner - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#48,227
“thons” frequency rank
#127
“ton” frequency rank
48354
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature thons ton
Definition Pluriel de thon. Déterminant possessif dont le possesseur est la deuxième personne du singulier et le possédé est masculin singulier.

Same sound, different letters: thons vs ton

Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 3 letters.

5 ch
thons
3 ch
ton

Ear matches; page differs - thons and ton

Say them out loud and nothing separates them: thons and ton carry the same recorded pronunciation, \tɔ̃\. Grammar is what tells them apart: one is anoun, the other adeterminer, so most sentences will only accept one of them. They differ by 2 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 48354, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

thons is recorded at frequency rank #48,227, classified as anoun, pronounced \tɔ̃\. ton is at rank #127, tagged as adet, pronounced \tɔ̃\.

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 48354, this pair ranks #179,590 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of thons vs ton

Shared letters: not. Private to "thons": hs. Private to "ton": -.

"thons" · 5 letters · shape CCVCC  ·  "ton" · 3 letters · shape CVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • thonshtons · thhons · thnos · thonns · thonss · thosn · tohns · tthons

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "thons" for "ton" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "thons" is a noun and "ton" a determiner, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "thons" or "ton"?
"ton" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #127 in our French list, against #48,227 for "thons". 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 "thons" / "ton". Follow the links when you need the full entry or a neighbour that trips the same ear.

  • Full dictionary entry for "thons" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "ton" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #179,590 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "thons" and "ton" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "thons 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 #179,590 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