CarrèrevscerbèreWhich spelling fits?

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

Which to use

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

#36,295
“Carrère” frequency rank
#42,223
“cerbère” frequency rank
78518
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature Carrère cerbère
Definition Nom de famille. Gardien sévère, par allusion au chien à trois têtes qui, selon la fable, gardait la porte des Enfers.

Letter map: Carrère vs cerbère

Shared letters muted; letters that set Carrère and cerbère apart highlighted. Shared run: 5. Carrère and cerbère follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCCVCV). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

7 ch
Carrère
7 ch
cerbère

Grammar separator: Carrère vs cerbère

Our dataset has no pronunciation recorded for both members, so the reliable separator here is grammatical: Carrère is aname and cerbèreanoun. On the page they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 78518, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

Carrère is recorded at frequency rank #36,295, classified as aname. cerbère is at rank #42,223, tagged as anoun, pronounced \sɛʁ.bɛʁ\.

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 78518, this pair ranks #25,536 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of Carrère vs cerbère

Shared letters: cerè. Private to "Carrère": a. Private to "cerbère": b.

"Carrère" · 7 letters · shape CVCCVCV  ·  "cerbère" · 7 letters · shape CVCCVCV

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "Carrère" and "cerbère" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "Carrère" is a name and "cerbère" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "Carrère" or "cerbère"?
"Carrère" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #36,295 in our French list, against #42,223 for "cerbère". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Done with this confusable. These links stay specific to "Carrère" and "cerbère".

  • Full dictionary entry for "Carrère" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "cerbère" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #25,536 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "Carrère" and "cerbère" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "cerbère vs cernée". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #25,536 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