couchervscouchezConfusable pair

Which to use

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

#2,271
“coucher” frequency rank
#37,751
“couchez” frequency rank
40022
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature coucher couchez
Definition Étendre de son long sur la terre, sur un lit, etc., mettre quelque chose en position horizontale. Deuxième personne du pluriel de l’indicatif présent de coucher.

Same sound, different letters: coucher vs couchez

Muted letters are shared; highlighted letters are the only spelling cue when pronunciation matches. Shared run: 6 letters.

7 ch
coucher
7 ch
couchez

Ear matches; page differs - coucher and couchez

This is the hard kind. coucher and couchez are pronounced identically (\ku.ʃe\) and both work as averb. Neither the ear nor the grammar will rescue you; only the meaning does, so the glosses below are the whole decision. They differ by a single letter - r in “coucher” becomes z in “couchez”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 40022, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

coucher is recorded at frequency rank #2,271, classified as averb, pronounced \ku.ʃe\. couchez is at rank #37,751, tagged as averb, pronounced \ku.ʃe\.

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 40022, this pair ranks #243,613 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of coucher vs couchez

Shared letters: cehou. Private to "coucher": r. Private to "couchez": z.

"coucher" · 7 letters · shape CVVCCVC  ·  "couchez" · 7 letters · shape CVVCCVC

Known mistypes of this pair

  • coucherccoucher · cocuher · couccher · coucehr · coucherr · couchher · couchre · couhcer
  • couchezccouchez · cocuhez · coucchez · coucehz · couchezz · couchhez · couchze · couhcez

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "coucher" for "couchez" ever safe?
No. They are pronounced the same (\ku.ʃe\), which is exactly why they get swapped in writing, but the dictionary meanings above are different, and pronunciation is no guide here.
Which is more common, "coucher" or "couchez"?
"coucher" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #2,271 in our French list, against #37,751 for "couchez". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

Useful next steps

Sound matches; spelling doesn't. Use the exits below to lock the right form or check a cousin pair.

  • Full dictionary entry for "coucher" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "couchez" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #243,613 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "coucher" and "couchez" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "coaches vs couchez". 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 #243,613 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