claquervscliquerWhich spelling fits?

Which to use

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

#14,881
“claquer” frequency rank
#10,471
“cliquer” frequency rank
25352
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature claquer cliquer
Definition Faire un certain bruit aigu et éclatant. Enfoncer et relâcher le bouton-poussoir (ou cliquet) d’une souris ou d’un dispositif similaire.

Where the eye mixes claquer and cliquer

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 6 letters in sequence. claquer and cliquer follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CCVCVVC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

7 ch
claquer
7 ch
cliquer

Look-alike desk: claquer vs cliquer

A purely visual mix-up. claquer (\kla.ke\) and cliquer (\kli.ke\) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by a single letter - a in “claquer” becomes i in “cliquer”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 25352, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

claquer is recorded at frequency rank #14,881, classified as averb, pronounced \kla.ke\. cliquer is at rank #10,471, tagged as averb, pronounced \kli.ke\.

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 25352, this pair ranks #341,362 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of claquer vs cliquer

Shared letters: celqru. Private to "claquer": a. Private to "cliquer": i.

"claquer" · 7 letters · shape CCVCVVC  ·  "cliquer" · 7 letters · shape CCVCVVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • claquer ← calquer · cclaquer · claqeur · claqquer · claquerr · claqure · clauqer · cllaquer
  • cliquer ← ccliquer · cilquer · cliqeur · cliqquer · cliquerr · cliqure · cliuqer · clliquer

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "claquer" and "cliquer" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\kla.ke\ versus \kli.ke\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "claquer" or "cliquer"?
"cliquer" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #10,471 in our French list, against #14,881 for "claquer". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.

  • Full dictionary entry for "claquer" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "cliquer" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #341,362 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "claquer" and "cliquer" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "claquée vs claquer". 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 #341,362 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