chancevscharteWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

“chance” and “charte” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#577
“chance” frequency rank
#2,811
“charte” frequency rank
3388
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature chance charte
Definition Concours de circonstances jugé malheureux ou heureux quant à son influence sur le succès, la réalisation, la réussite ou l’échec d’une action ou d’un événement ; contexte jugé favorable ou non d’une action. Acte écrit public ou privé de l’époque médiévale, fait et passé devant témoins et portant le plus souvent le sceau de son auteur.

Where the eye mixes chance and charte

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

6 ch
chance
6 ch
charte

Why the eye confuses chance with charte

A purely visual mix-up. chance (\ʃɑ̃s\) and charte (\ʃaʁt\) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 3388, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

chance is recorded at frequency rank #577, classified as anoun, pronounced \ʃɑ̃s\. charte is at rank #2,811, tagged as anoun, pronounced \ʃaʁt\.

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 3388, this pair ranks #434,149 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of chance vs charte

Shared letters: aceh. Private to "chance": n. Private to "charte": rt.

"chance" · 6 letters · shape CCVCCV  ·  "charte" · 6 letters · shape CCVCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • chancecahnce · cchance · chacne · chancce · chanec · channce · chhance · chnace
  • chartecahrte · ccharte · charet · charrte · chartte · chatre · chharte · chrate

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "chance" and "charte" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\ʃɑ̃s\ versus \ʃaʁt\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "chance" or "charte"?
"chance" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #577 in our French list, against #2,811 for "charte". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "chance" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "charte" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #434,149 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "chance" and "charte" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "charmée vs charte". 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 #434,149 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