cimesvscrimeConfusable pair

Which to use

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

#37,727
“cimes” frequency rank
#1,907
“crime” frequency rank
39634
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature cimes crime
Definition Pluriel de cime. Infraction très grave, à la morale ou à la loi.

Where the eye mixes cimes and crime

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

5 ch
cimes
5 ch
crime

Why the eye confuses cimes with crime

A purely visual mix-up. cimes (\sim\) and crime (\kʁim\) 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 4 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 39634, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

cimes is recorded at frequency rank #37,727, classified as anoun, pronounced \sim\. crime is at rank #1,907, tagged as anoun, pronounced \kʁim\.

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 39634, this pair ranks #246,519 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of cimes vs crime

Shared letters: ceim. Private to "cimes": s. Private to "crime": r.

"cimes" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC  ·  "crime" · 5 letters · shape CCVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • cimesccimes · ciems · cimess · cimmes · cimse · cmies · icmes
  • crimeccrime · cirme · criem · crimme · crmie · crrime · rcime

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "cimes" and "crime" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\sim\ versus \kʁim\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "cimes" or "crime"?
"crime" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #1,907 in our French list, against #37,727 for "cimes". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Useful next steps

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "cimes" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "crime" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #246,519 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "cimes" and "crime" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "cakes vs cimes". 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 #246,519 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