CharlesvscharméeWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: Charles is a name, charmée is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“Charles” is a name and “charmée” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#1,176
“Charles” frequency rank
#49,549
“charmée” frequency rank
50725
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature Charles charmée
Definition Prénom masculin. Féminin singulier de charmé.

Where the eye mixes Charles and charmée

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence. Charles (CCVCCVC) and charmée (CCVCCVV) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.

7 ch
Charles
7 ch
charmée

Why the eye confuses Charles with charmée

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: Charles is \ʃaʁl\ while charmée is \ʃaʁ.me\. 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 (name vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 50725, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

Charles is recorded at frequency rank #1,176, classified as aname, pronounced \ʃaʁl\. charmée is at rank #49,549, tagged as anadj, pronounced \ʃaʁ.me\.

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 50725, this pair ranks #160,446 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of Charles vs charmée

Shared letters: acehr. Private to "Charles": ls. Private to "charmée": mé.

"Charles" · 7 letters · shape CCVCCVC  ·  "charmée" · 7 letters · shape CCVCCVV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • Charles ← cahrles · ccharles · chalres · charels · charless · charlles · charlse · charrles

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "Charles" and "charmée" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "Charles" is a name and "charmée" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary French text, does "Charles" or "charmée" show up more?
"Charles" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #1,176 in our French list, against #49,549 for "charmée". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

What to do next

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "Charles" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "charmée" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #160,446 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "Charles" and "charmée" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "charmée vs charrie". 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 #160,446 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