crabevscribleWhat's the difference?

Which to use

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

#17,915
“crabe” frequency rank
#27,390
“crible” frequency rank
45305
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature crabe crible
Definition Crustacé décapode, à large carapace, dont on mange la chair. Instrument percé d’un grand nombre de trous qui sert à trier des objets de grosseur ou de qualité inégales, en laissant passer les uns et en repoussant les autres.

Where the eye mixes crabe and crible

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

5 ch
crabe
6 ch
crible

Visual trap between crabe and crible

A purely visual mix-up. crabe (\kʁab\) and crible (\kʁibl\) 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 45305, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

crabe is recorded at frequency rank #17,915, classified as anoun, pronounced \kʁab\. crible is at rank #27,390, tagged as anoun, pronounced \kʁibl\.

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 45305, this pair ranks #203,767 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.

Orthographic DNA of crabe vs crible

Shared letters: bcer. Private to "crabe": a. Private to "crible": il.

"crabe" · 5 letters · shape CCVCV  ·  "crible" · 6 letters · shape CCVCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • crabecarbe · ccrabe · crabbe · craeb · crbae · crrabe · rcabe
  • cribleccrible · cirble · crbile · cribble · cribel · criblle · crilbe · crrible

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "crabe" and "crible" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No. They are said differently (\kʁab\ versus \kʁibl\) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary French text, does "crabe" or "crible" show up more?
"crabe" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #17,915 in our French list, against #27,390 for "crible". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Visual near-miss handled. Browse the word pages or a neighbour when the next look-alike shows up.

  • Full dictionary entry for "crabe" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "crible" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #203,767 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "crabe" and "crible" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "crabe vs curage". 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 #203,767 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