banquevsbasqueConfusable pair

Quick tell: banque is a noun, basque is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“banque” is a noun and “basque” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#1,134
“banque” frequency rank
#8,503
“basque” frequency rank
9637
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature banque basque
Definition Commerce de l'argent et du crédit qui consiste à recevoir des capitaux en compte courant avec ou sans intérêt ; à échanger des effets ou à les escompter avec des espèces, à des taux et moyennant des commissions variables ; à exécuter pour le compte de tiers toutes opérations de ce genre et à se charger de tous services financiers ; à créer et à émettre des lettres de change ; d’une façon générale, commercer de l’argent, ainsi que des titres et valeurs. Relatif au Pays basque ou aux Basques.

Where the eye mixes banque and basque

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence.

6 ch
banque
6 ch
basque

Visual trap between banque and basque

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: banque is \bɑ̃k\ while basque is \bask\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by a single letter - n in “banque” becomes s in “basque”, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 9637, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

banque is recorded at frequency rank #1,134, classified as anoun, pronounced \bɑ̃k\. basque is at rank #8,503, tagged as anadj, pronounced \bask\.

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 9637, this pair ranks #415,953 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of banque vs basque

Shared letters: abequ. Private to "banque": n. Private to "basque": s.

"banque" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVV  ·  "basque" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • banqueabnque · bannque · banqeu · banqque · banuqe · baqnue · bbanque · bnaque
  • basqueabsque · baqsue · basqeu · basqque · bassque · basuqe · bbasque · bsaque

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "banque" and "basque" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "banque" is a noun and "basque" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "banque" or "basque"?
"banque" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #1,134 in our French list, against #8,503 for "basque". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.

  • Full dictionary entry for "banque" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "basque" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #415,953 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "banque" and "basque" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "basale vs basque". 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 #415,953 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