yuanvsyuansWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#19,717
“yuan” frequency rank
#39,601
“yuans” frequency rank
59318
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature yuan yuans
Definition Devise officielle de la Chine. Un yuan vaut 10 jiaos et 100 fens. Code ISO 4217 : CNY. Pluriel de yuan.

Same sound, different letters: yuan vs yuans

Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 4 letters.

4 ch
yuan
5 ch
yuans

Homophone desk: yuan vs yuans

This is the hard kind. yuan and yuans are pronounced identically (\jɥan\) and both work as anoun. Neither the ear nor the grammar will rescue you; only the meaning does, so the glosses below are the whole decision. They differ by 1 extra letter(s) - “yuan” sits inside “yuans”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 59318, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

yuan is recorded at frequency rank #19,717, classified as anoun, pronounced \jɥan\. yuans is at rank #39,601, tagged as anoun, pronounced \jɥan\.

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 59318, this pair ranks #103,817 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of yuan vs yuans

Shared letters: anuy. Private to "yuan": -. Private to "yuans": s.

"yuan" · 4 letters · shape VVVC  ·  "yuans" · 5 letters · shape VVVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • yuanuyan · yaun · yuann · yuna · yyuan
  • yuansuyans · yauns · yuanns · yuanss · yuasn · yunas · yyuans

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "yuan" for "yuans" ever safe?
No. They are pronounced the same (\jɥan\), which is exactly why they get swapped in writing, but the dictionary meanings above are different, and pronunciation is no guide here.
Frequency check: "yuan" vs "yuans" - which ranks higher?
"yuan" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #19,717 in our French list, against #39,601 for "yuans". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Sound matches; spelling doesn't. Use the exits below to lock the right form or check a cousin pair.

  • Full dictionary entry for "yuan" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "yuans" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #103,817 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "yuan" and "yuans" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "yuan vs yum". 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 #103,817 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