commencesvscommenterTell them apart

Which to use

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

#9,800
“commences” frequency rank
#7,167
“commenter” frequency rank
16967
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature commences commenter
Definition Deuxième personne du singulier de l’indicatif présent de commencer. Interpréter par un commentaire, par des commentaires.

Where the eye mixes commences and commenter

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 7 letters in sequence.

9 ch
commences
9 ch
commenter

Look-alike desk: commences vs commenter

A purely visual mix-up. commences (\kɔ.mɑ̃s\) and commenter (\kɔ.mɑ̃.te\) 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 16967, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

commences is recorded at frequency rank #9,800, classified as averb, pronounced \kɔ.mɑ̃s\. commenter is at rank #7,167, tagged as averb, pronounced \kɔ.mɑ̃.te\.

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 16967, this pair ranks #385,423 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of commences vs commenter

Shared letters: cemno. Private to "commences": s. Private to "commenter": rt.

"commences" · 9 letters · shape CVCCVCCVC  ·  "commenter" · 9 letters · shape CVCCVCCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • commencesccommences · cmomences · comemnces · comences · commecnes · commencces · commencess · commencse
  • commenterccommenter · cmomenter · comemnter · comenter · commenetr · commennter · commenterr · commentre

Frequently Asked Questions

Can "commences" and "commenter" be used interchangeably?
No. They are said differently (\kɔ.mɑ̃s\ versus \kɔ.mɑ̃.te\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary French text, does "commences" or "commenter" show up more?
"commenter" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #7,167 in our French list, against #9,800 for "commences". 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 "commences" and "commenter" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "commences" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "commenter" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #385,423 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "commences" and "commenter" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "commencées vs commences". 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 #385,423 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