tournoivstournoisWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: tournoi is a noun, tournois is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“tournoi” is a noun and “tournois” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#2,549
“tournoi” frequency rank
#7,505
“tournois” frequency rank
10054
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature tournoi tournois
Definition Compétition amicale, sans enjeu important et ne donnant pas lieu à l'attribution d'un titre. Relatif à des pièces de monnaie qui se frappaient à Tours et qui étaient plus faibles d’un cinquième que celles de Paris, ou frappées sur le modèle de celles de Tours après le XIII^(ème) siècle.

Same sound, different letters: tournoi vs tournois

Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 7 letters.

7 ch
tournoi
8 ch
tournois

Same sound, different spelling - tournoi / tournois

Say them out loud and nothing separates them: tournoi and tournois carry the same recorded pronunciation, \tuʁ.nwa\. Grammar is what tells them apart: one is anoun, the other anadjective, so most sentences will only accept one of them. They differ by 1 extra letter(s) - “tournoi” sits inside “tournois”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 10054, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

tournoi is recorded at frequency rank #2,549, classified as anoun, pronounced \tuʁ.nwa\. tournois is at rank #7,505, tagged as anadj, pronounced \tuʁ.nwa\.

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 10054, this pair ranks #414,383 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of tournoi vs tournois

Shared letters: inortu. Private to "tournoi": -. Private to "tournois": s.

"tournoi" · 7 letters · shape CVVCCVV  ·  "tournois" · 8 letters · shape CVVCCVVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • tournoioturnoi · torunoi · tounroi · tournio · tournnoi · touroni · tourrnoi · ttournoi
  • tournoisoturnois · torunois · tounrois · tournios · tournnois · tournoiss · tournosi · touronis

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "tournoi" and "tournois" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "tournoi" is a noun and "tournois" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "tournoi" vs "tournois" - which ranks higher?
"tournoi" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #2,549 in our French list, against #7,505 for "tournois". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "tournoi" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "tournois" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #414,383 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "tournoi" and "tournois" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "tournais vs tournois". 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 #414,383 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