café
/ˌkæˈfeɪ/
"cafe" is a 4-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“café” has 5 generated spelling variants in the English index at frequency #10,342. The variants make it a useful spelling check.
- #10,342
- frequency rank, English
- 43,570
- “C” headwords
- 5
- tracked misspellings
- 20
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - 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.
Visual similarity to commonly confused words
How many letter changes separate each confused pair (Levenshtein distance, normalized).
Source: PlainSpell confusable corpus (Wiktionary, CC BY-SA).
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | café |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /ˌkæˈfeɪ/ |
| Letters | 4 |
| Frequency rank | #10,342 |
| Misspellings tracked | 5 |
| Confusable pairs | 20 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “café” sits in English frequency
A misspelling magnet
The generator records 5 spelling variants around café (IPA /ˌkæˈfeɪ/), anoun. Corpus frequency is #10,342 among 43,570 “C” headwords. Wiktionary lists 2 senses, so context still picks the gloss.
Our generated misspelling index lists 5 likely wrong-spelling variants for café, with forms such as "acfé", "caffé", and "caéf". Each variant is a distinct typo pattern an edit-distance generator flags, typically a doubled-consonant error, a silent-letter drop, or a vowel substitution. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "CE", "can", "car", and more, a pairing that trips writers up because the two words share enough sound or shape to blur together.
Etymologically, the entry records: Unadapted borrowing from French café (“coffee; coffee shop”). Doublet of caffè and coffee. The correct English form is café, spelled C-A-F-É.
Definition
- 1A 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.
- 2A small restaurant of any genre.
Etymology
Unadapted borrowing from French café (“coffee; coffee shop”). Doublet of caffè and coffee.
Synonyms
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as:
- acfé
- caffé
- caéf
- ccafé
- cfaé
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of café - counted as single-character edits (an insertion, a deletion, or a substituted letter). The larger the bar, the easier the typo is to spot; one-edit slips are the ones that sneak past readers.
Definitions, pronunciation, and etymology for this entry are drawn from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org structured extract (CC BY-SA); frequency ordering uses the FrequencyWords open word-frequency list (2018 English corpus, MIT). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.
Frequently Asked Questions
How do you spell "café"?
What does "café" mean?
What words are commonly confused with "café"?
How do you pronounce "café"?
What is the origin of the word "café"?
Is PlainSpell free to use?
Using “café”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is C-A-F-É - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /ˌkæˈfeɪ/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “CE” - see the side-by-side comparison. café vs CE
- Browse more English words and confusable pairs in the same reference. English words
Same frequency band
Data Source
Wiktionary (via kaikki.org), licensed under CC BY-SA & GFDL. Word ordering uses an open word-frequency list; misspelling variants are generated by edit-distance from the correct headword.