caricaturalvscaricaturesTell them apart

Quick tell: caricatural is a adjective, caricatures is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

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

#36,293
“caricatural” frequency rank
#19,469
“caricatures” frequency rank
55762
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature caricatural caricatures
Definition Qui tient de la caricature. Pluriel de caricature.

Where the eye mixes caricatural and caricatures

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 9 letters in sequence. caricatural and caricatures follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCVCVCVCVC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

11 ch
caricatural
11 ch
caricatures

Visual trap between caricatural and caricatures

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: caricatural is \ka.ʁi.ka.ty.ʁal\ while caricatures is \ka.ʁi.ka.tyʁ\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (adjective vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 55762, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

caricatural is recorded at frequency rank #36,293, classified as anadj, pronounced \ka.ʁi.ka.ty.ʁal\. caricatures is at rank #19,469, tagged as anoun, pronounced \ka.ʁi.ka.tyʁ\.

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 55762, this pair ranks #125,384 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of caricatural vs caricatures

Shared letters: acirtu. Private to "caricatural": l. Private to "caricatures": es.

"caricatural" · 11 letters · shape CVCVCVCVCVC  ·  "caricatures" · 11 letters · shape CVCVCVCVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • caricatural ← acricatural · caircatural · carciatural · cariactural · caricatrual · caricattural · caricatuarl · caricaturall
  • caricatures ← acricatures · caircatures · carciatures · cariactures · caricatrues · caricattures · caricatuers · caricaturess

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "caricatural" and "caricatures" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "caricatural" is an adjective and "caricatures" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "caricatural" vs "caricatures" - which ranks higher?
"caricatures" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #19,469 in our French list, against #36,293 for "caricatural". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "caricatural" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "caricatures" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #125,384 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "caricatural" and "caricatures" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "caricatural vs caricaturale". 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 #125,384 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