vendsvsvenirWhat's the difference?

Which to use

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

#8,479
“vends” frequency rank
#548
“venir” frequency rank
9027
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature vends venir
Definition Première personne du singulier de l’indicatif présent de vendre. Se rendre sur le lieu où se trouve celui qui parle ou dont on parle.

Where the eye mixes vends and venir

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.

5 ch
vends
5 ch
venir

Visual trap between vends and venir

A purely visual mix-up. vends (\vɑ̃\) and venir (\və.niʁ\) 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 9027, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

vends is recorded at frequency rank #8,479, classified as averb, pronounced \vɑ̃\. venir is at rank #548, tagged as averb, pronounced \və.niʁ\.

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 9027, this pair ranks #418,048 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of vends vs venir

Shared letters: env. Private to "vends": ds. Private to "venir": ir.

"vends" · 5 letters · shape CVCCC  ·  "venir" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • vendsevnds · vedns · vendds · vendss · vennds · vensd · vneds · vvends
  • venirevnir · veinr · venirr · vennir · venri · vneir · vvenir

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "vends" and "venir" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently (\vɑ̃\ versus \və.niʁ\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary French text, does "vends" or "venir" show up more?
"venir" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #548 in our French list, against #8,479 for "vends". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

After this comparison

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "vends" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "venir" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #418,048 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "vends" and "venir" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "vends vs veufs". 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 #418,048 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