compagnevscompanyTell them apart

Which to use

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

#7,038
“compagne” frequency rank
#11,735
“company” frequency rank
18773
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature compagne company
Definition Celle qui partage le sort de quelqu’un. Société (4: commerciale, industrielle, financière), firme, entreprise.

Where the eye mixes compagne and company

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 6 letters in sequence.

8 ch
compagne
7 ch
company

Visual trap between compagne and company

A purely visual mix-up. compagne (\kɔ̃.paɲ\) and company (\ˈkʌm.pə.ni\) 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 18773, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

compagne is recorded at frequency rank #7,038, classified as anoun, pronounced \kɔ̃.paɲ\. company is at rank #11,735, tagged as anoun, pronounced \ˈkʌm.pə.ni\.

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 18773, this pair ranks #376,652 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of compagne vs company

Shared letters: acmnop. Private to "compagne": eg. Private to "company": y.

"compagne" · 8 letters · shape CVCCVCCV  ·  "company" · 7 letters · shape CVCCVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • compagneccompagne · cmopagne · comapgne · commpagne · compagen · compaggne · compagnne · compange
  • companyccompany · cmopany · comapny · commpany · companny · companyy · compayn · compnay

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "compagne" for "company" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (\kɔ̃.paɲ\ versus \ˈkʌm.pə.ni\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Which is more common, "compagne" or "company"?
"compagne" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #7,038 in our French list, against #11,735 for "company". 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 "compagne" and "company" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "compagne" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "company" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #376,652 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "compagne" and "company" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "company vs comparu". 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 #376,652 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