Cafe or café?
cafe is a noun meaning “A coffee shop; an establishment selling coffee and sometimes other…”; café is a noun meaning “A coffee shop; an establishment selling coffee and sometimes other…”. In written English (wordfreq, 2021 data) cafe is about as common as café.
What is the difference between cafe and café?
| cafe | café | |
|---|---|---|
| Part of speech | noun | noun |
| Meaning | A coffee shop; an establishment selling coffee and sometimes other non-alcoholic beverages, simple meals or snacks, with a facility to consume them on the… CanadaA small restaurant of any genre A convenience store, originally one that sold coffee and similar basic items | A coffee shop; an establishment selling coffee and sometimes other non-alcoholic beverages, simple meals or snacks, with a facility to consume them on the… CanadaA small restaurant of any genre A convenience store, originally one that sold coffee and similar basic items |
| Example | none recorded | none recorded |
| Forms | cafés cafes | cafés cafes |
| Pronunciation | /ˌkæˈfeɪ/ /ˈkæfeɪ/ | /ˌkæˈfeɪ/ /ˈkæfeɪ/ |
| In writing | 12 times per million words | 12 times per million words |
Sources: cafe and café in the English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0); written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
Every current meaning of cafe and café
cafe
- 1
A coffee shop; an establishment selling coffee and sometimes other non-alcoholic beverages, simple meals or snacks, with a facility to consume them on the premises
- 2
Alternative form of café
- 3
Acronym of Corporate Average Fuel Economy
- 4
CanadaA small restaurant of any genre
- 5
A convenience store, originally one that sold coffee and similar basic items
café
- 1
A coffee shop; an establishment selling coffee and sometimes other non-alcoholic beverages, simple meals or snacks, with a facility to consume them on the premises
- 2
Alternative form of café
- 3
Acronym of Corporate Average Fuel Economy
- 4
CanadaA small restaurant of any genre
- 5
A convenience store, originally one that sold coffee and similar basic items
Source: the English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0); obsolete, archaic, dialect and rare senses left out.
Which is more common, cafe or café?
cafe appears 12 times per million words; café 12 times per million words.
cafe 12 times per million wordscafé 12 times per million words
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
How many people search cafe vs café?
“cafe vs café” is searched about 140 times a month on Google and 10 on Bing in the United States. Google counts close variants of a query together (“café vs cafe”, “cafe or café”).
Sources: Google Ads keyword data through DataForSEO and Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, the average month from September 2025 to August 2026.