Which to use
“barre” and “bourre” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #2,068
- “barre” frequency rank
- #17,887
- “bourre” frequency rank
- 19955
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | barre | bourre |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Pièce de bois, de métal, etc., étroite et longue. | Amas de poils détachés de la peau de certains animaux à poil ras, tels que les bovins, les chevaux, etc. |
Where the eye mixes barre and bourre
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence.
Look-alike desk: barre vs bourre
A purely visual mix-up. barre (\baʁ\) and bourre (\buʁ\) 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 19955, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
barre is recorded at frequency rank #2,068, classified as anoun, pronounced \baʁ\. bourre is at rank #17,887, tagged as anoun, pronounced \buʁ\.
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 19955, this pair ranks #370,683 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of barre vs bourre
Shared letters: ber. Private to "barre": a. Private to "bourre": ou.
"barre" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV · "bourre" · 6 letters · shape CVVCCV
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "barre" and "bourre" mean the same thing in a sentence?
In ordinary French text, does "barre" or "bourre" show up more?
What to do next
Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.
- Full dictionary entry for "barre" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "bourre" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #370,683 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "barre" and "bourre" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "bourdes vs bourre". 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 #370,683 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.