caavsclacWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: caa is a noun, clac is an onomatopoeia, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“caa” is a noun and “clac” is an onomatopoeia - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#44,346
“caa” frequency rank
#36,310
“clac” frequency rank
80656
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature caa clac
Definition Chasse, pêche. Onomatopée qui traduit un bruit sec et rapide.

Where the eye mixes caa and clac

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence. caa runs 3 letters (CVV) against clac's 4 (CCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

3 ch
caa
4 ch
clac

Why the eye confuses caa with clac

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: caa is \caː\ while clac is \klak\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs onomatopoeia), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 80656, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

caa is recorded at frequency rank #44,346, classified as anoun, pronounced \caː\. clac is at rank #36,310, tagged as anonomatopoeia, pronounced \klak\.

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 80656, this pair ranks #20,455 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of caa vs clac

Shared letters: ac. Private to "caa": -. Private to "clac": l.

"caa" · 3 letters · shape CVV  ·  "clac" · 4 letters · shape CCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • clac ← calc · cclac · clacc · clca · cllac · lcac

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "caa" and "clac" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "caa" is a noun and "clac" an onomatopoeia, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary French text, does "caa" or "clac" show up more?
"clac" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #36,310 in our French list, against #44,346 for "caa". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "caa" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "clac" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #20,455 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "caa" and "clac" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "caa vs CCE". 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 #20,455 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