cornervscornuTell them apart

Quick tell: corner is a verb, cornu is an adjective, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“corner” is a verb and “cornu” is an adjective - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#13,555
“corner” frequency rank
#34,963
“cornu” frequency rank
48518
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature corner cornu
Definition Sonner d’un cornet ou d’une corne. Qui a des cornes.

Where the eye mixes corner and cornu

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

6 ch
corner
5 ch
cornu

Visual trap between corner and cornu

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: corner is \kɔʁ.ne\ while cornu is \kɔʁ.ny\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (verb vs adjective), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 48518, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

corner is recorded at frequency rank #13,555, classified as averb, pronounced \kɔʁ.ne\. cornu is at rank #34,963, tagged as anadj, pronounced \kɔʁ.ny\.

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 48518, this pair ranks #178,286 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of corner vs cornu

Shared letters: cnor. Private to "corner": e. Private to "cornu": u.

"corner" · 6 letters · shape CVCCVC  ·  "cornu" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • cornerccorner · conrer · corenr · cornerr · cornner · cornre · corrner · croner
  • cornuccornu · conru · cornnu · corrnu · corun · cronu · ocrnu

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "corner" and "cornu" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "corner" is a verb and "cornu" an adjective, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "corner" or "cornu"?
"corner" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #13,555 in our French list, against #34,963 for "cornu". 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 "corner" and "cornu" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "corner" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "cornu" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #178,286 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "corner" and "cornu" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "coon vs cornu". 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 #178,286 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