vidvsvisConfusable pair

Quick tell: vid is a adjective, vis is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

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

#40,076
“vid” frequency rank
#993
“vis” frequency rank
41069
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature vid vis
Definition Vide. Pièce mécanique formée d’un corps qui comporte un filet de forme hélicoïdale et une tête où une empreinte permet d’appliquer un couple ; il en résulte un double mouvement de rotation et de translation. En mécanique, elles sont souvent employées avec des écrous pour former des boulons.

Letter map: vid vs vis

Shared letters muted; letters that set vid and vis apart highlighted. Shared run: 2.

3 ch
vid
3 ch
vis

Part-of-speech tell for vid / vis

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: vid is anadjective and visanoun. On the page they differ by a single letter - d in “vid” becomes s in “vis”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 41069, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

vid is recorded at frequency rank #40,076, classified as anadj. vis is at rank #993, tagged as anoun, pronounced \vis\.

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 41069, this pair ranks #235,751 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of vid vs vis

Shared letters: iv. Private to "vid": d. Private to "vis": s.

"vid" · 3 letters · shape CVC  ·  "vis" · 3 letters · shape CVC

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "vid" and "vis" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "vid" is an adjective and "vis" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "vid" or "vis"?
"vis" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #993 in our French list, against #40,076 for "vid". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Useful next steps

Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "vid" and "vis".

  • Full dictionary entry for "vid" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "vis" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #235,751 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "vid" and "vis" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "vid vs viv". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #235,751 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