Which to use
“conscience” and “consciences” are a confusable French pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #1,513
- “conscience” frequency rank
- #21,274
- “consciences” frequency rank
- 22787
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | conscience | consciences |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Subjectivité ; sentiment intime de présence à soi, de vivre l’expérience actuelle du réel, d’être le sujet de nos perceptions, émotions, pensées… | Pluriel de conscience. |
Same sound, different letters: conscience vs consciences
Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 10 letters.
Same sound, different spelling - conscience / consciences
This is the hard kind. conscience and consciences are pronounced identically (\kɔ̃.sjɑ̃s\) and both work as anoun. Neither the ear nor the grammar will rescue you; only the meaning does, so the glosses below are the whole decision. They differ by 1 extra letter(s) - “conscience” sits inside “consciences”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 22787, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
conscience is recorded at frequency rank #1,513, classified as anoun, pronounced \kɔ̃.sjɑ̃s\. consciences is at rank #21,274, tagged as anoun, pronounced \kɔ̃.sjɑ̃s\.
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 22787, this pair ranks #356,157 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.
Orthographic DNA of conscience vs consciences
Shared letters: ceinos. Private to "conscience": -. Private to "consciences": -.
"conscience" · 10 letters · shape CVCCCVVCCV · "consciences" · 11 letters · shape CVCCCVVCCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
- conscience ← cconscience · cnoscience · concsience · connscience · consccience · consceince · consciecne · consciencce
- consciences ← cconsciences · cnosciences · concsiences · connsciences · conscciences · consceinces · consciecnes · consciencces
Frequently Asked Questions
Can "conscience" and "consciences" be used interchangeably?
Which is more common, "conscience" or "consciences"?
After this comparison
You've separated the homophone pair "conscience" / "consciences". Follow the links when you need the full entry or a neighbour that trips the same ear.
- Full dictionary entry for "conscience" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "consciences" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #356,157 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "conscience" and "consciences" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "consciences vs conscientes". 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 #356,157 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.