chargevschargeurTell them apart

Which to use

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

#786
“charge” frequency rank
#11,012
“chargeur” frequency rank
11798
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature charge chargeur
Definition Ce qui pèse. Celui qui charge des marchandises ou autres fardeaux.

Where the eye mixes charge and chargeur

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 6 letters in sequence.

6 ch
charge
8 ch
chargeur

Visual trap between charge and chargeur

A purely visual mix-up. charge (\ʃaʁʒ\) and chargeur (\ʃaʁ.ʒœʁ\) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 2 extra letter(s) - “charge” sits inside “chargeur”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 11798, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

charge is recorded at frequency rank #786, classified as anoun, pronounced \ʃaʁʒ\. chargeur is at rank #11,012, tagged as anoun, pronounced \ʃaʁ.ʒœʁ\.

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 11798, this pair ranks #407,755 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of charge vs chargeur

Shared letters: aceghr. Private to "charge": -. Private to "chargeur": u.

"charge" · 6 letters · shape CCVCCV  ·  "chargeur" · 8 letters · shape CCVCCVVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • chargecahrge · ccharge · chagre · chareg · chargge · charrge · chharge · chrage
  • chargeurcahrgeur · cchargeur · chagreur · charegur · chargeru · chargeurr · charggeur · charguer

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "charge" for "chargeur" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (\ʃaʁʒ\ versus \ʃaʁ.ʒœʁ\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "charge" or "chargeur"?
"charge" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #786 in our French list, against #11,012 for "chargeur". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

After this comparison

Eye-level mix-up between "charge" and "chargeur" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "charge" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "chargeur" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #407,755 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "charge" and "chargeur" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "chargeur vs chargez". 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 #407,755 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