clamevscrâneWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#30,947
“clame” frequency rank
#4,659
“crâne” frequency rank
35606
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature clame crâne
Definition Outillage de maintien d’une pièce mécanique pendant son usinage ou sa modification. Assemblage des os de la tête, partie du squelette destinée à protéger l’encéphale.

Where the eye mixes clame and crâne

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 2 letters in sequence.

5 ch
clame
5 ch
crâne

Visual trap between clame and crâne

A purely visual mix-up. clame (\klam\) and crâne (\kʁɑn\) 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 35606, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

clame is recorded at frequency rank #30,947, classified as anoun, pronounced \klam\. crâne is at rank #4,659, tagged as anoun, pronounced \kʁɑn\.

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 35606, this pair ranks #275,485 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of clame vs crâne

Shared letters: ce. Private to "clame": alm. Private to "crâne": nrâ.

"clame" · 5 letters · shape CCVCV  ·  "crâne" · 5 letters · shape CCVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • clamecclame · claem · clamme · cllame · clmae · lcame

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "clame" and "crâne" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\klam\ versus \kʁɑn\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "clame" or "crâne"?
"crâne" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #4,659 in our French list, against #30,947 for "clame". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

After this comparison

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "clame" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "crâne" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #275,485 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "clame" and "crâne" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "clame vs clavel". 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 #275,485 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