agacevsagrafeTell them apart

Which to use

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

#18,638
“agace” frequency rank
#48,312
“agrafe” frequency rank
66950
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature agace agrafe
Definition Nom vulgaire de la pie bavarde dans plusieurs parties de la France ou de la Belgique. On trouve les graphies agace, agasse, agache. Petit accessoire métallique servant à réunir deux éléments d’un même objet.

Where the eye mixes agace and agrafe

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. agace runs 5 letters (VCVCV) against agrafe's 6 (VCCVCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

5 ch
agace
6 ch
agrafe

Why the eye confuses agace with agrafe

A purely visual mix-up. agace (\a.ɡas\) and agrafe (\a.ɡʁaf\) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 66950, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

agace is recorded at frequency rank #18,638, classified as anoun, pronounced \a.ɡas\. agrafe is at rank #48,312, tagged as anoun, pronounced \a.ɡʁaf\.

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 66950, this pair ranks #65,572 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of agace vs agrafe

Shared letters: aeg. Private to "agace": c. Private to "agrafe": fr.

"agace" · 5 letters · shape VCVCV  ·  "agrafe" · 6 letters · shape VCCVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • agace ← aagce · agacce · agaec · agcae · aggace · gaace
  • agrafe ← agarfe · aggrafe · agraef · agraffe · agrfae · agrrafe · argafe · garafe

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "agace" for "agrafe" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (\a.ɡas\ versus \a.ɡʁaf\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "agace" vs "agrafe" - which ranks higher?
"agace" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #18,638 in our French list, against #48,312 for "agrafe". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

Eye-level mix-up between "agace" and "agrafe" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "agace" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "agrafe" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #65,572 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "agace" and "agrafe" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "agrafe vs agrafes". 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 #65,572 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