caissonvsClissonTell them apart

Quick tell: caisson is a noun, Clisson is a name, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“caisson” is a noun and “Clisson” is a name - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#24,889
“caisson” frequency rank
#43,848
“Clisson” frequency rank
68737
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature caisson Clisson
Definition Grande caisse sur un train à deux ou quatre roues qui servait ordinairement pour porter des vivres et des munitions à l’armée. Commune française, située dans le département de la Loire-Atlantique.

Where the eye mixes caisson and Clisson

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 6 letters in sequence.

7 ch
caisson
7 ch
Clisson

Why the eye confuses caisson with Clisson

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: caisson is \kɛ.sɔ̃\ while Clisson is \kli.sɔ̃\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by a single letter - a in “caisson” becomes l in “Clisson”, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs name), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 68737, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

caisson is recorded at frequency rank #24,889, classified as anoun, pronounced \kɛ.sɔ̃\. Clisson is at rank #43,848, tagged as aname, pronounced \kli.sɔ̃\.

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 68737, this pair ranks #57,920 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of caisson vs Clisson

Shared letters: cinos. Private to "caisson": a. Private to "Clisson": l.

"caisson" · 7 letters · shape CVVCCVC  ·  "Clisson" · 7 letters · shape CCVCCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • caissonacisson · caison · caisosn · caissno · caissonn · casison · ccaisson · ciasson
  • Clissoncclisson · cilsson · clison · clisosn · clissno · clissonn · cllisson · clsison

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "caisson" for "Clisson" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "caisson" is a noun and "Clisson" a name, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary French text, does "caisson" or "Clisson" show up more?
"caisson" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #24,889 in our French list, against #43,848 for "Clisson". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.

  • Full dictionary entry for "caisson" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "Clisson" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #57,920 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "caisson" and "Clisson" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Clisson vs crimson". 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 #57,920 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