Which to use
“ce” is a determiner and “cese” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #25
- “ce” frequency rank
- #47,212
- “cese” frequency rank
- 47237
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | ce | cese |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Déterminant utilisé pour mettre en évidence une chose ou une personne dont on a la représentation devant soi. Lorsque l’objet est en nombre multiple ou lorsqu’on veut appuyer encore plus sur ce qu’on veut montrer, on rajoute -ci ou -là (selon la distance) après le nom. | Cessation, action de cesser. |
Where the eye mixes ce and cese
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.
Visual trap between ce and cese
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: ce is \sə\ while cese is \ˈθese\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 2 extra letter(s) - “ce” sits inside “cese”, and the parts of speech differ too (determiner vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 47237, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
ce is recorded at frequency rank #25, classified as adet, pronounced \sə\. cese is at rank #47,212, tagged as anoun, pronounced \ˈθese\.
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 47237, this pair ranks #188,469 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of ce vs cese
Shared letters: ce. Private to "ce": -. Private to "cese": s.
"ce" · 2 letters · shape CV · "cese" · 4 letters · shape CVCV
Known mistypes of this pair
- cese ← ccese · cees · csee · ecse
Frequently Asked Questions
Do "ce" and "cese" mean the same thing in a sentence?
In ordinary French text, does "ce" or "cese" show up more?
After this comparison
Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.
- Full dictionary entry for "ce" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "cese" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #188,469 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "ce" and "cese" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "CCE vs cese". 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 #188,469 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.