clôturesvsculturesWhat's the difference?

Which to use

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

#25,929
“clôtures” frequency rank
#3,246
“cultures” frequency rank
29175
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature clôtures cultures
Definition Pluriel de clôture. Pluriel de culture.

Where the eye mixes clôtures and cultures

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 7 letters in sequence. clôtures (CCVCVCVC) and cultures (CVCCVCVC) run the same length but a different consonant-vowel pattern - the shape difference is usually the fastest tell.

8 ch
clôtures
8 ch
cultures

Look-alike desk: clôtures vs cultures

A purely visual mix-up. clôtures (\klo.tyʁ\) and cultures (\kyl.tyʁ\) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they share most of their letters but differ in 2 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 29175, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

clôtures is recorded at frequency rank #25,929, classified as anoun, pronounced \klo.tyʁ\. cultures is at rank #3,246, tagged as anoun, pronounced \kyl.tyʁ\.

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 29175, this pair ranks #318,305 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of clôtures vs cultures

Shared letters: celrstu. Private to "clôtures": ô. Private to "cultures": -.

"clôtures" · 8 letters · shape CCVCVCVC  ·  "cultures" · 8 letters · shape CVCCVCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • culturesccultures · clutures · culltures · cultrues · culttures · cultuers · culturess · culturres

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "clôtures" for "cultures" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (\klo.tyʁ\ versus \kyl.tyʁ\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "clôtures" vs "cultures" - which ranks higher?
"cultures" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #3,246 in our French list, against #25,929 for "clôtures". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "clôtures" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "cultures" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #318,305 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "clôtures" and "cultures" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "clôturer vs clôtures". 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 #318,305 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