basicvsbasiquesWhat's the difference?

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

Which to use

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

#21,542
“basic” frequency rank
#18,407
“basiques” frequency rank
39949
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature basic basiques
Definition Variante de BASIC. Pluriel de basique.

Same sound, different letters: basic vs basiques

Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 4 letters.

5 ch
basic
8 ch
basiques

Same sound, different spelling - basic / basiques

Say them out loud and nothing separates them: basic and basiques carry the same recorded pronunciation, \ba.zik\. Grammar is what tells them apart: one is anoun, the other anadjective, so most sentences will only accept one of them. They differ by 3 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 39949, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

basic is recorded at frequency rank #21,542, classified as anoun, pronounced \ba.zik\. basiques is at rank #18,407, tagged as anadj, pronounced \ba.zik\.

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 39949, this pair ranks #244,159 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of basic vs basiques

Shared letters: abis. Private to "basic": c. Private to "basiques": equ.

"basic" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC  ·  "basiques" · 8 letters · shape CVCVCVVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • basicabsic · baisc · basci · basicc · bassic · bbasic · bsaic
  • basiquesabsiques · baisques · basiqeus · basiqques · basiquess · basiquse · basiuqes · basqiues

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "basic" for "basiques" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "basic" is a noun and "basiques" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary French text, does "basic" or "basiques" show up more?
"basiques" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #18,407 in our French list, against #21,542 for "basic". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Sound matches; spelling doesn't. Use the exits below to lock the right form or check a cousin pair.

  • Full dictionary entry for "basic" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "basiques" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #244,159 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "basic" and "basiques" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Basel vs basic". 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 #244,159 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