valisesvsvalléesConfusable pair

Which to use

“valises” and “vallées” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#10,966
“valises” frequency rank
#10,098
“vallées” frequency rank
21064
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature valises vallées
Definition Pluriel de valise. Pluriel de vallée.

Where the eye mixes valises and vallées

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence.

7 ch
valises
7 ch
vallées

Why the eye confuses valises with vallées

A purely visual mix-up. valises (\va.liz\) and vallées (\va.le\) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 21064, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

valises is recorded at frequency rank #10,966, classified as anoun, pronounced \va.liz\. vallées is at rank #10,098, tagged as anoun, pronounced \va.le\.

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 21064, this pair ranks #365,043 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of valises vs vallées

Shared letters: aelsv. Private to "valises": i. Private to "vallées": é.

"valises" · 7 letters · shape CVCVCVC  ·  "vallées" · 7 letters · shape CVCCVVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • valisesavlises · vailses · valiess · valisess · valisses · vallises · valsies · vlaises

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "valises" and "vallées" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\va.liz\ versus \va.le\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary French text, does "valises" or "vallées" show up more?
"vallées" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #10,098 in our French list, against #10,966 for "valises". 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 "valises" and "vallées" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "valises" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "vallées" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #365,043 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "valises" and "vallées" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "valises vs valorisés". 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 #365,043 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