cordéevscortexWhat's the difference?

Which to use

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

#40,693
“cordée” frequency rank
#17,397
“cortex” frequency rank
58090
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature cordée cortex
Definition Ce qui peut être entouré d'une corde. Couche superficielle ou périphérique d’un tissu organique.

Where the eye mixes cordée and cortex

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

6 ch
cordée
6 ch
cortex

Why the eye confuses cordée with cortex

A purely visual mix-up. cordée (\kɔʁ.de\) and cortex (\kɔʁ.tɛks\) 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 3 positions. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 58090, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

cordée is recorded at frequency rank #40,693, classified as anoun, pronounced \kɔʁ.de\. cortex is at rank #17,397, tagged as anoun, pronounced \kɔʁ.tɛks\.

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 58090, this pair ranks #111,096 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of cordée vs cortex

Shared letters: ceor. Private to "cordée": . Private to "cortex": tx.

"cordée" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVV  ·  "cortex" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • cortexccortex · coretx · corrtex · cortexx · corttex · cortxe · cotrex · crotex

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "cordée" for "cortex" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (\kɔʁ.de\ versus \kɔʁ.tɛks\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "cordée" vs "cortex" - which ranks higher?
"cortex" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #17,397 in our French list, against #40,693 for "cordée". 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 "cordée" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "cortex" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #111,096 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "cordée" and "cortex" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "conde vs cordée". 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 #111,096 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