cernéevscornerConfusable pair

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

Which to use

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

#44,362
“cernée” frequency rank
#13,555
“corner” frequency rank
57917
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature cernée corner
Definition Féminin singulier de cerné. Sonner d’un cornet ou d’une corne.

Where the eye mixes cernée and corner

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence.

6 ch
cernée
6 ch
corner

Why the eye confuses cernée with corner

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: cernée is \sɛʁ.ne\ while corner is \kɔʁ.ne\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 3 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (adjective vs verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 57917, 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\. corner is at rank #13,555, tagged as averb, pronounced \kɔʁ.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 57917, this pair ranks #112,153 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of cernée vs corner

Shared letters: cenr. Private to "cernée": é. Private to "corner": o.

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

Known mistypes of this pair

  • cornerccorner · conrer · corenr · cornerr · cornner · cornre · corrner · croner

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "cernée" for "corner" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "cernée" is an adjective and "corner" a verb, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary French text, does "cernée" or "corner" show up more?
"corner" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #13,555 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.

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 "cernée" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "corner" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #112,153 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "cernée" and "corner" 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 #112,153 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