cernéevscernerTell them apart

Quick tell: cernée is a adjective, cerner is a verb, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“cernée” is an adjective and “cerner” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#44,362
“cernée” frequency rank
#14,218
“cerner” frequency rank
58580
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature cernée cerner
Definition Féminin singulier de cerné. Entourer, investir un lieu de manière à ôter toute communication, tout moyen de secours extérieur ou de fuite à ceux qui s’y trouvent.

Same sound, different letters: cernée vs cerner

Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 5 letters.

6 ch
cernée
6 ch
cerner

Ear matches; page differs - cernée and cerner

Say them out loud and nothing separates them: cernée and cerner carry the same recorded pronunciation, \sɛʁ.ne\. Grammar is what tells them apart: one is anadjective, the other averb, so most sentences will only accept one of them. They share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 58580, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

cernée is recorded at frequency rank #44,362, classified as anadj, pronounced \sɛʁ.ne\. cerner is at rank #14,218, tagged as averb, pronounced \sɛʁ.ne\.

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 58580, this pair ranks #108,225 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of cernée vs cerner

Shared letters: cenr. Private to "cernée": é. Private to "cerner": -.

"cernée" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVV  ·  "cerner" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • cernerccerner · cenrer · cerenr · cernerr · cernner · cernre · cerrner · crener

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "cernée" and "cerner" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "cernée" is an adjective and "cerner" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "cernée" or "cerner"?
"cerner" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #14,218 in our French list, against #44,362 for "cernée". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

"cernée" and "cerner" share a sound, keep the gloss open, then jump to the headword or a nearby trap.

  • Full dictionary entry for "cernée" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "cerner" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #108,225 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "cernée" and "cerner" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "carne vs cernée". 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 #108,225 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