comsvscomtésWhat's the difference?

Which to use

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

#36,773
“coms” frequency rank
#18,441
“comtés” frequency rank
55214
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature coms comtés
Definition Abréviation populaire de commissions. Pluriel de comté.

Where the eye mixes coms and comtés

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence.

4 ch
coms
6 ch
comtés

Visual trap between coms and comtés

A purely visual mix-up. coms (\kɔm\) and comtés (\kɔ̃.te\) 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 2 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 55214, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

coms is recorded at frequency rank #36,773, classified as anoun, pronounced \kɔm\. comtés is at rank #18,441, tagged as anoun, pronounced \kɔ̃.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 55214, this pair ranks #128,921 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of coms vs comtés

Shared letters: cmos. Private to "coms": -. Private to "comtés": .

"coms" · 4 letters · shape CVCC  ·  "comtés" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • comsccoms · cmos · comms · comss · cosm · ocms

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "coms" for "comtés" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (\kɔm\ versus \kɔ̃.te\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "coms" vs "comtés" - which ranks higher?
"comtés" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #18,441 in our French list, against #36,773 for "coms". 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 "coms" and "comtés" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "coms" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "comtés" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #128,921 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "coms" and "comtés" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "coms vs kom". 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 #128,921 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