contevscoreWhat's the difference?

Which to use

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

#4,741
“conte” frequency rank
#16,102
“core” frequency rank
20843
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature conte core
Definition Récit d’aventures imaginaires, soit qu’elles aient de la vraisemblance ou que s’y mêle du merveilleux, du féerique. Centre, noyau.

Where the eye mixes conte and core

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

5 ch
conte
4 ch
core

Look-alike desk: conte vs core

A purely visual mix-up. conte (\kɔ̃t\) and core (\kɔː\) 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 20843, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

conte is recorded at frequency rank #4,741, classified as anoun, pronounced \kɔ̃t\. core is at rank #16,102, tagged as anoun, pronounced \kɔː\.

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 20843, this pair ranks #366,201 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of conte vs core

Shared letters: ceo. Private to "conte": nt. Private to "core": r.

"conte" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV  ·  "core" · 4 letters · shape CVCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • contecconte · cnote · conet · connte · contte · cotne · ocnte
  • coreccore · coer · corre · croe

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "conte" for "core" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (\kɔ̃t\ versus \kɔː\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary French text, does "conte" or "core" show up more?
"conte" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #4,741 in our French list, against #16,102 for "core". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

What to do next

Pronunciation already separates them, if the page still looks alike, the dictionary links below settle it.

  • Full dictionary entry for "conte" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "core" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #366,201 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "conte" and "core" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "conde vs core". 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 #366,201 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