clinvsconTell them apart

Which to use

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

#9,619
“clin” frequency rank
#1,056
“con” frequency rank
10675
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature clin con
Definition Clignement. Sexe de la femme.

Where the eye mixes clin and con

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

4 ch
clin
3 ch
con

Why the eye confuses clin with con

A purely visual mix-up. clin (\klɛ̃\) and con (\kɔ̃\) 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 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 10675, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

clin is recorded at frequency rank #9,619, classified as anoun, pronounced \klɛ̃\. con is at rank #1,056, tagged as anoun, pronounced \kɔ̃\.

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 10675, this pair ranks #412,076 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of clin vs con

Shared letters: cn. Private to "clin": il. Private to "con": o.

"clin" · 4 letters · shape CCVC  ·  "con" · 3 letters · shape CVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • clincclin · ciln · clinn · cllin · clni · lcin

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "clin" and "con" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\klɛ̃\ versus \kɔ̃\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "clin" or "con"?
"con" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #1,056 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 "clin" and "con" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "clin" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "con" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #412,076 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "clin" and "con" 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 #412,076 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