clochettevsclochettesTell them apart

Which to use

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

#31,890
“clochette” frequency rank
#47,230
“clochettes” frequency rank
79120
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature clochette clochettes
Definition Cloche de petite taille. Pluriel de clochette.

Same sound, different letters: clochette vs clochettes

Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 9 letters. clochette runs 9 letters (CCVCCVCCV) against clochettes's 10 (CCVCCVCCVC) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

9 ch
clochette
10 ch
clochettes

Same sound, different spelling - clochette / clochettes

This is the hard kind. clochette and clochettes are pronounced identically (\klɔ.ʃɛt\) and both work as anoun. Neither the ear nor the grammar will rescue you; only the meaning does, so the glosses below are the whole decision. They differ by 1 extra letter(s) - “clochette” sits inside “clochettes”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 79120, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

clochette is recorded at frequency rank #31,890, classified as anoun, pronounced \klɔ.ʃɛt\. clochettes is at rank #47,230, tagged as anoun, pronounced \klɔ.ʃɛt\.

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 79120, this pair ranks #24,034 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of clochette vs clochettes

Shared letters: cehlot. Private to "clochette": -. Private to "clochettes": s.

"clochette" · 9 letters · shape CCVCCVCCV  ·  "clochettes" · 10 letters · shape CCVCCVCCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • clochettecclochette · clcohette · cllochette · clocchette · clocehtte · clochete · clochetet · clochhette
  • clochettescclochettes · clcohettes · cllochettes · clocchettes · clocehttes · clochetes · clochetets · clochettess

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "clochette" and "clochettes" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are pronounced the same (\klɔ.ʃɛt\), which is exactly why they get swapped in writing, but the dictionary meanings above are different, and pronunciation is no guide here.
In ordinary French text, does "clochette" or "clochettes" show up more?
"clochette" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #31,890 in our French list, against #47,230 for "clochettes". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

You've separated the homophone pair "clochette" / "clochettes". Follow the links when you need the full entry or a neighbour that trips the same ear.

  • Full dictionary entry for "clochette" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "clochettes" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #24,034 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "clochette" and "clochettes" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "cachettes vs clochettes". 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 #24,034 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