bassinevsbastideTell them apart

Which to use

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

#33,566
“bassine” frequency rank
#24,873
“bastide” frequency rank
58439
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature bassine bastide
Definition Sorte de bassin en métal, large et profond dont on se sert pour y faire chauffer, bouillir, fondre, cuire, etc., diverses substances. Élément de fortification.

Where the eye mixes bassine and bastide

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence. bassine and bastide follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCCVCV). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

7 ch
bassine
7 ch
bastide

Look-alike desk: bassine vs bastide

A purely visual mix-up. bassine (\ba.sin\) and bastide (\bas.tid\) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 58439, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

bassine is recorded at frequency rank #33,566, classified as anoun, pronounced \ba.sin\. bastide is at rank #24,873, tagged as anoun, pronounced \bas.tid\.

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 58439, this pair ranks #109,077 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of bassine vs bastide

Shared letters: abeis. Private to "bassine": n. Private to "bastide": dt.

"bassine" · 7 letters · shape CVCCVCV  ·  "bastide" · 7 letters · shape CVCCVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • bassine ← abssine · basine · basisne · bassien · bassinne · bassnie · bbassine · bsasine
  • bastide ← abstide · basitde · basstide · bastdie · bastidde · bastied · basttide · batside

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "bassine" for "bastide" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (\ba.sin\ versus \bas.tid\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "bassine" or "bastide"?
"bastide" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #24,873 in our French list, against #33,566 for "bassine". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "bassine" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "bastide" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #109,077 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "bassine" and "bastide" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "bashing vs bassine". 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 #109,077 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