école

\e.kɔl\

/\e.kɔl\/ noun

By · According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA) ·

The verdict

“école” has 7 generated spelling variants in the French index at frequency #421. The variants make it a useful spelling check.

#421
frequency rank, French
40,273
“É” headwords
7
tracked misspellings
20
confusable pairs

According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - Lieu dédié à l’apprentissage.

Visual similarity to commonly confused words

How many letter changes separate each confused pair (Levenshtein distance, normalized).

école vs ele
40% similar
école vs elle
40% similar
école vs égale
60% similar

Source: PlainSpell confusable corpus (Wiktionary, CC BY-SA).

Key facts for école
PropertyValue
Headwordécole
LanguageFrench
Part of speechNoun
IPA\e.kɔl\
Letters5
Frequency rank#421
Misspellings tracked7
Confusable pairs20
SourceWiktionary (kaikki.org)

Where “école” sits in French frequency

Every-word frequency runs from the handful of words we use constantly (left) to the long tail used once in a blue moon (right). école lands here:

#1#100#1K#10K#100K
← used constantlyrarely used →

Scale is logarithmic (each tick is 10× rarer). Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list.

A misspelling magnet

The generator records 7 spelling variants around école (IPA \e.kɔl\), anoun. Corpus frequency is #421 among 40,273 “É” headwords. Wiktionary lists 8 senses, so context still picks the gloss.

Our generated misspelling index lists 7 likely wrong-spelling variants for école, with forms such as "céole", "ecole", and "éccole". Every one of these variants traces to a single-character edit -- an added or dropped letter, a swapped consonant, or a vowel swap -- the kind of slip a spell-checker is built to catch. It also participates in 20 confusable-pair relationships, "ele", "elle", "égale", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.

No borrowing history is documented for this entry, so any spelling logic here comes from how the word's sounds map to letters, not a documented origin story. The correct French form is école, spelled É-C-O-L-E.

Definition

  1. 1
    Lieu dédié à l’apprentissage.
  2. 2
    Établissement où l’on enseigne les savoirs fondamentaux comme la lecture et l’écriture et qui est aussi désigné sous le nom d’école primaire.
  3. 3
    Tous les élèves d’un tel établissement, ou l’ensemble de ses professeurs et de ses employés.
  4. 4
    Ce qui est propre à former, à donner de l’expérience en quelque chose, à instruire.
  5. 5
    Enseignement de la théologie et de la philosophie, suivant la méthode et les principes reçus dans la plupart des anciennes universités.
  6. 6
    Mouvement ou doctrine d’un philosophe ou d’un savant.
  7. 7
    Classe d’artistes qui travaillent ou qui ont travaillé selon les principes, à l’imitation d’un même maître, ou suivant les habitudes propres à certaines époques de l’art, à certains lieux.
  8. 8
    Terme emprunté au jeu de trictrac : Faire une école, oublier de marquer les points que l’on gagne, ou en marquer mal à propos. Souvent employé au sens figuré : commettre une faute par inexpérience, ignorance ou étourderie.

This word in other languages

school(English)escuela(Español)Schule(Deutsch)escola(Português)

Common misspellings

Also misspelled as:

  • céole
  • ecole
  • éccole
  • écloe
  • écoel
  • écolle
  • éocle

Misspelling Pattern Breakdown

How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of école - expressed in single-character edits (insert, delete, or swap one letter). Bigger bars stand out at a glance; a one-edit slip is the hardest to catch.

céole2ecole1éccole1écloe2écoel2écolle1éocle2
Edit distance from "école"

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 French corpus, MIT). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.

Frequently Asked Questions

How do you spell "école"?
"école" is spelled É-C-O-L-E. The IPA pronunciation is \e.kɔl\.
What does "école" mean?
As a noun, "école" means: Lieu dédié à l’apprentissage.
What words are commonly confused with "école"?
"école" is commonly confused with "ele", "elle", "égale". These words look or sound similar but have different meanings. PlainSpell provides detailed comparisons for each pair.
How do you pronounce "école"?
The IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) transcription for "école" is \e.kɔl\. Click the speaker icon on the pronunciation badge above to hear it spoken aloud where audio is available.
What language does "école" come from?
"école" is a French word. PlainSpell covers definitions, pronunciations, and spelling data across English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and German.
Is PlainSpell free to use?
Yes, PlainSpell is a completely free word reference. You can look up definitions, pronunciations, confusable pairs, homophones, and spelling corrections across 5 languages without any sign-up or subscription.

Using “école”

The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.

  • The one correct French spelling is É-C-O-L-E - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
  • Say it as \e.kɔl\ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
  • Don't mix it up with “ele” - see the side-by-side comparison. école vs ele
  • Browse more French words and confusable pairs in the same reference. French 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.

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list FrequencyWords open word-frequency list