Which to use
“cabaye” and “cobaye” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #27,714
- “cabaye” frequency rank
- #30,099
- “cobaye” frequency rank
- 57813
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | cabaye | cobaye |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Autre orthographe de cabaille. | Petit mammifère appelé aussi cochon d’Inde, rongeur d’origine sud-américaine. |
Where the eye mixes cabaye and cobaye
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence. cabaye and cobaye follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCVVV). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.
Look-alike desk: cabaye vs cobaye
A purely visual mix-up. cabaye (\ka.baj\) and cobaye (\kɔ.baj\) 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 a single letter - a in “cabaye” becomes o in “cobaye”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 57813, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
cabaye is recorded at frequency rank #27,714, classified as anoun, pronounced \ka.baj\. cobaye is at rank #30,099, tagged as anoun, pronounced \kɔ.baj\.
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 57813, this pair ranks #112,803 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of cabaye vs cobaye
Shared letters: abcey. Private to "cabaye": -. Private to "cobaye": o.
"cabaye" · 6 letters · shape CVCVVV · "cobaye" · 6 letters · shape CVCVVV
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "cabaye" and "cobaye" mean the same thing in a sentence?
Frequency check: "cabaye" vs "cobaye" - which ranks higher?
Useful next steps
Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.
- Full dictionary entry for "cabaye" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "cobaye" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #112,803 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "cabaye" and "cobaye" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "cabaye vs câblage". 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 #112,803 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.