commevscrimeWhat's the difference?

Quick tell: comme is a adverb, crime is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“comme” is an adverb and “crime” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#51
“comme” frequency rank
#1,907
“crime” frequency rank
1958
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature comme crime
Definition De même que ; ainsi que. Infraction très grave, à la morale ou à la loi.

Where the eye mixes comme and crime

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

5 ch
comme
5 ch
crime

Spelling & Dictionary Insight

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: comme is \kɔm\ while crime is \kʁim\. 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 (adverb vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 1958, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

comme is recorded at frequency rank #51, classified as anadv, pronounced \kɔm\. crime is at rank #1,907, tagged as anoun, pronounced \kʁim\.

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 1958, this pair ranks #437,058 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of comme vs crime

Shared letters: cem. Private to "comme": o. Private to "crime": ir.

"comme" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV  ·  "crime" · 5 letters · shape CCVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • commeccomme · cmome · comem · ocmme
  • crimeccrime · cirme · criem · crimme · crmie · crrime · rcime

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "comme" and "crime" be used interchangeably?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "comme" is an adverb and "crime" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "comme" or "crime"?
"comme" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #51 in our French list, against #1,907 for "crime". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list