Which to use
“clean” is an adjective and “cream” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #11,931
- “clean” frequency rank
- #28,121
- “cream” frequency rank
- 40052
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | clean | cream |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Propre, sans saleté. | Crème (aliment). |
Where the eye mixes clean and cream
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence. clean and cream follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CCVVC). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.
Look-alike desk: clean vs cream
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: clean is \klin\ while cream is \kɹiːm\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions, and the parts of speech differ too (adjective vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 40052, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
clean is recorded at frequency rank #11,931, classified as anadj, pronounced \klin\. cream is at rank #28,121, tagged as anoun, pronounced \kɹiːm\.
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 40052, this pair ranks #243,407 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of clean vs cream
Shared letters: ace. Private to "clean": ln. Private to "cream": mr.
"clean" · 5 letters · shape CCVVC · "cream" · 5 letters · shape CCVVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "clean" for "cream" ever safe?
In ordinary French text, does "clean" or "cream" show up more?
What to do next
Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.
- Full dictionary entry for "clean" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "cream" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #243,407 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "clean" and "cream" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "crau vs cream". 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 #243,407 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.