Which to use
“vœu” is a noun and “voui” is an adverb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #11,688
- “vœu” frequency rank
- #45,950
- “voui” frequency rank
- 57638
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | vœu | voui |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Promesse faite à Dieu, par laquelle on s’engage à quelque œuvre que l’on croit lui être agréable, et qui n’est pas de précepte. | Oui. |
Where the eye mixes vœu and voui
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: vœu is \vø\ while voui is \vwi\. 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 (noun vs adverb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 57638, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
vœu is recorded at frequency rank #11,688, classified as anoun, pronounced \vø\. voui is at rank #45,950, tagged as anadv, pronounced \vwi\.
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 57638, this pair ranks #113,831 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of vœu vs voui
Shared letters: uv. Private to "vœu": œ. Private to "voui": io.
"vœu" · 3 letters · shape CVV · "voui" · 4 letters · shape CVVV
Known mistypes of this pair
- voui ← ovui · voiu · vuoi · vvoui