coupurevscousueConfusable pair

Which to use

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

#9,632
“coupure” frequency rank
#39,728
“cousue” frequency rank
49360
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature coupure cousue
Definition Séparation ou division faite en tranchant dans un corps continu. Cigarette industrielle, déjà roulée, par opposition à celle que l’on roule soi-même.

Where the eye mixes coupure and cousue

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence. coupure runs 7 letters (CVVCVCV) against cousue's 6 (CVVCVV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

7 ch
coupure
6 ch
cousue

Why the eye confuses coupure with cousue

A purely visual mix-up. coupure (\ku.pyʁ\) and cousue (\ku.zy\) 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 49360, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

coupure is recorded at frequency rank #9,632, classified as anoun, pronounced \ku.pyʁ\. cousue is at rank #39,728, tagged as anoun, pronounced \ku.zy\.

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 49360, this pair ranks #171,337 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of coupure vs cousue

Shared letters: ceou. Private to "coupure": pr. Private to "cousue": s.

"coupure" · 7 letters · shape CVVCVCV  ·  "cousue" · 6 letters · shape CVVCVV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • coupure ← ccoupure · copuure · couppure · couprue · coupuer · coupurre · couupre · cuopure
  • cousue ← ccousue · cosuue · couseu · coussue · couuse · cuosue · ocusue

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "coupure" for "cousue" ever safe?
No. They are said differently (\ku.pyʁ\ versus \ku.zy\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
Frequency check: "coupure" vs "cousue" - which ranks higher?
"coupure" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #9,632 in our French list, against #39,728 for "cousue". 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 "coupure" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "cousue" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #171,337 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "coupure" and "cousue" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "courus vs cousue". 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 #171,337 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