Which to use
“vigan” is a noun and “vilain” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #50,000
- “vigan” frequency rank
- #10,607
- “vilain” frequency rank
- 60607
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | vigan | vilain |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Gros drap de laine foulée, de faible qualité, ni tondu, ni peigné, il contenait 960 fils de chaîne pour une largeur de 3/4 d'aune. | Qui déplaît à la vue. |
Where the eye mixes vigan and vilain
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. vigan runs 5 letters (CVCVC) against vilain's 6 (CVCVVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.
Visual trap between vigan and vilain
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: vigan is \vi.ɡɑ̃\ while vilain is \vi.lɛ̃\. 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 adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 60607, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
vigan is recorded at frequency rank #50,000, classified as anoun, pronounced \vi.ɡɑ̃\. vilain is at rank #10,607, tagged as anadj, pronounced \vi.lɛ̃\.
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 60607, this pair ranks #96,761 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of vigan vs vilain
Shared letters: ainv. Private to "vigan": g. Private to "vilain": l.
"vigan" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC · "vilain" · 6 letters · shape CVCVVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "vigan" and "vilain" mean the same thing in a sentence?
Which is more common, "vigan" or "vilain"?
Useful next steps
Eye-level mix-up between "vigan" and "vilain" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.
- Full dictionary entry for "vigan" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "vilain" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #96,761 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "vigan" and "vilain" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "vigan vs vlan". 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 #96,761 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.