cinglésvscivilesTell them apart

Which to use

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

#40,670
“cinglés” frequency rank
#6,597
“civiles” frequency rank
47267
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature cinglés civiles
Definition Masculin pluriel de cinglé. Féminin pluriel de civil.

Where the eye mixes cinglés and civiles

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. cinglés (CVCCCVC) and civiles (CVCVCVC) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.

7 ch
cinglés
7 ch
civiles

Visual trap between cinglés and civiles

A purely visual mix-up. cinglés (\sɛ̃.ɡle\) and civiles (\si.vil\) 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 3 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 47267, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

cinglés is recorded at frequency rank #40,670, classified as anadj, pronounced \sɛ̃.ɡle\. civiles is at rank #6,597, tagged as anadj, pronounced \si.vil\.

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 47267, this pair ranks #188,272 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of cinglés vs civiles

Shared letters: cils. Private to "cinglés": gné. Private to "civiles": ev.

"cinglés" · 7 letters · shape CVCCCVC  ·  "civiles" · 7 letters · shape CVCVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • civiles ← cciviles · ciivles · civiels · civiless · civilles · civilse · civlies · civviles

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "cinglés" and "civiles" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\sɛ̃.ɡle\ versus \si.vil\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "cinglés" vs "civiles" - which ranks higher?
"civiles" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #6,597 in our French list, against #40,670 for "cinglés". 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 "cinglés" and "civiles" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "cinglés" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "civiles" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #188,272 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "cinglés" and "civiles" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "cinglés vs congres". 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 #188,272 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