clicvsclinWhich spelling fits?

Quick tell: clic is a onomatopoeia, clin is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“clic” is an onomatopoeia and “clin” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#9,618
“clic” frequency rank
#9,619
“clin” frequency rank
19237
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature clic clin
Definition Onomatopée exprimant un bruit sec, un claquement. Clignement.

Where the eye mixes clic and clin

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.

4 ch
clic
4 ch
clin

Visual trap between clic and clin

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: clic is \klik\ while clin is \klɛ̃\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by a single letter - c in “clic” becomes n in “clin”, and the parts of speech differ too (onomatopoeia vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 19237, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

clic is recorded at frequency rank #9,618, classified as anonomatopoeia, pronounced \klik\. clin is at rank #9,619, tagged as anoun, pronounced \klɛ̃\.

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 19237, this pair ranks #374,261 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of clic vs clin

Shared letters: cil. Private to "clic": -. Private to "clin": n.

"clic" · 4 letters · shape CCVC  ·  "clin" · 4 letters · shape CCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • cliccclic · cilc · clci · clicc · cllic · lcic
  • clincclin · ciln · clinn · cllin · clni · lcin

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "clic" and "clin" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "clic" is an onomatopoeia and "clin" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
In ordinary French text, does "clic" or "clin" show up more?
"clic" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #9,618 in our French list, against #9,619 for "clin". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

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

  • Full dictionary entry for "clic" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "clin" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #374,261 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "clic" and "clin" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "clin vs coon". 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 #374,261 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