charsvschocsTell them apart

Which to use

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

#8,971
“chars” frequency rank
#10,840
“chocs” frequency rank
19811
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature chars chocs
Definition Pluriel de char. Pluriel de choc.

Where the eye mixes chars and chocs

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.

5 ch
chars
5 ch
chocs

Look-alike desk: chars vs chocs

A purely visual mix-up. chars (\ʃaʁ\) and chocs (\ʃɔk\) 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 19811, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

chars is recorded at frequency rank #8,971, classified as anoun, pronounced \ʃaʁ\. chocs is at rank #10,840, tagged as anoun, pronounced \ʃɔk\.

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 19811, this pair ranks #371,427 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of chars vs chocs

Shared letters: chs. Private to "chars": ar. Private to "chocs": o.

"chars" · 5 letters · shape CCVCC  ·  "chocs" · 5 letters · shape CCVCC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • charscahrs · cchars · charrs · charss · chasr · chhars · chras · hcars
  • chocscchocs · chcos · chhocs · choccs · chocss · chosc · cohcs · hcocs

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "chars" and "chocs" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\ʃaʁ\ versus \ʃɔk\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary French text, does "chars" or "chocs" show up more?
"chars" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #8,971 in our French list, against #10,840 for "chocs". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "chars" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "chocs" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #371,427 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "chars" and "chocs" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "chocs vs croco". 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 #371,427 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