Which to use
“courge” is a noun and “courre” is a verb - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.
- #30,546
- “courge” frequency rank
- #38,733
- “courre” frequency rank
- 69279
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | courge | courre |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | Genre de plantes de la famille des Cucurbitacées (Cucurbitaceae). | Forme ancienne de courir jusqu’au XIIIᵉ siècle. |
Where the eye mixes courge and courre
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence. courge and courre follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVVCCV). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.
Look-alike desk: courge vs courre
These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: courge is \kuʁʒ\ while courre is \kuʁ\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by a single letter - g in “courge” becomes r in “courre”, and the parts of speech differ too (noun vs verb), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 69279, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
courge is recorded at frequency rank #30,546, classified as anoun, pronounced \kuʁʒ\. courre is at rank #38,733, tagged as averb, pronounced \kuʁ\.
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 69279, this pair ranks #55,768 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.
Orthographic DNA of courge vs courre
Shared letters: ceoru. Private to "courge": g. Private to "courre": -.
"courge" · 6 letters · shape CVVCCV · "courre" · 6 letters · shape CVVCCV
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "courge" for "courre" ever safe?
Which is more common, "courge" or "courre"?
After this comparison
Eye-level mix-up between "courge" and "courre" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.
- Full dictionary entry for "courge" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "courre" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #55,768 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "courge" and "courre" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "courges vs courre". 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 #55,768 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.